


Classified

by melonpaan



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Do I need to warn for Reno karate chopping a kid?, F/M, Gen, Oh no what have I done, Secret bodyguards and alien princesses, Warning for language too, Warning for no beta too, Welp this is officially a Reno origin story now, jfc is the name of this draft in my google docs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-25
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:47:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24374506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonpaan/pseuds/melonpaan
Summary: “Does it hurt much?” Her eyes are like giant green marbles.“Yeah.”“Good,” she says viciously, and this time he does laugh. This little shit.Reno as Aerith's bodyguard through the years. But it's classified.
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough & Reno, Aerith Gainsborough/Reno, Reno & Rude (Compilation of FFVII), Reno & Tseng (Compilation of FFVII)
Comments: 82
Kudos: 96





	1. Nothing worth anything

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dreamfighter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamfighter/gifts).



> Consider this revenge. <3

Reno joins the Turks at fifteen, the youngest candidate to ever be plucked out of obscurity from the slums, so he wears his pride on the rolled up sleeves of the black suit still several sizes too big. He spends two months in rigorous training—which basically means two months getting his ass beat by Tseng in hand-to-hand combat, while also getting a crash course on assault weapons, espionage, sabotage—refining the petty larceny skills that got him scouted in the first place. (Veld lets him keep the pair of pilot’s goggles nicked from the inside of his suit jacket.)

And then, mere days later, along with a custom tailored suit, Reno gets his very first Turks assignment: Surveillance.

“This target is of the highest priority,” Tseng rumbles, handing him a folder labeled _Classified_ and Reno thinks, truly, he’s made it. “Don’t make me look bad.” And then Reno opens the file.

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me, Tseng!” But he’s already down the hallway and out of sight, and Reno should really know better. Tseng is never kidding.

It’s not surveillance—it’s _babysitting._

The target, codenamed “the Ancient”— _ha!_ —is nine years old with giant green cartoon eyes and mousy brown hair. Tseng is either the funniest motherfucker alive or Reno is a big damn joke, but either way he ain’t laughing. He tosses the folder under his bed and then flops on top of it, crossing his arms and _not_ sulking.

His room in Shinra’s mandated housing unit is tiny, barely fits the twin-sized mattress and desk crammed into the space—he doesn’t even have a chair—and the bathrooms are communal, but he’s topside and it’s the first real thing Reno’s ever been able to claim as his own, and he wants to keep it that way.

So he’ll babysit the goddamn brat.

While secretly hoping this is some kind of meta-level hazing ritual for the Turks.

Tailing the Ancient is easy work. He’s familiar enough with Sector 5 and she’s slow, incredibly clumsy, and dressed like a canary in a coal mine. She plays hide and seek with the other slum kids and is really bad at it, is usually among the first to be found and always giggles behind her hands when she’s caught. When she’s not with the brat pack, she visits the abandoned church, brings with her a filled plastic bottle to water a tiny patch of moss growing out of the floorboards. She’s so stupid. Moss thrives because it needs nothing. And nothing worth anything can grow in the slums without the sun. Inevitably she skips home after a day of traipsing through the alleyways, usually stopping by the grocery store to pick up a wrapped parcel of vegetables her mother has ordered. The grocery clerk calls her a good girl and hands her a sweet in addition to a woven basket laden with vegetables and cans that’s far too big for her to handle. But she heaves it with both her hands and toddles all the way back.

Every day makes Reno want to bash his head against a wall. He joined the Turks to get _out_ of the slums for fuck’s sake. And he’s so mad about it that on his fourth day of trailing her back home from the grocer’s, he decides to light a cigarette. The lighter is an antique, a souvenir from his beat spent prowling the alleyways behind the Loveless Theater, and it’s cool and still works so Reno likes it. It’s also loud. When he opens his eyes on the exhale, the brat’s no longer in sight. Ah, fuck. He tosses the cigarette to the ground as he races down the street searching for his canary, doubles back down a narrow alleyway when he spots bright yellow in his periphery. She’s inching slowly through the space, holding the basket above her head for dear life, glances back with panicked eyes as she redoubles her effort. The space is narrow even for his lanky ass, so he hightails it down the main street and circles around another corner to try and cut her off cause he’ll be damned if this brat costs him his new life.

He catches her just as she stumbles onto her knees, the basket flying out of her hands. “Looking for something?” She freezes and her eyes grow even wider if possible. She bolts in the direction of home—so predictable—and he rolls his eyes. He could find his way there blindfolded and in his sleep at this point. But she’s slow and won’t even give him the satisfaction of a real chase, and she’s clumsy so she ends up tripping over her own two feet on a bad turn and skids on her knees. She’s scrappy, though, picks herself up despite bloody knees that might make most kids faint, but by then he’s already caught up to her, grabs her by the collar of the dress only for her to whirl right around to kick him in the shin. He yelps and she twists herself out of his grasp and shoots for another cramped alleyway.

“You little shit.” He dives with his arms and yanks her back by the hair as she wails like a goddamn banshee, and Reno knows _she knows_ that this is the busy hour in the slums and someone is bound to hear and come running within minutes, and it won’t be a good look good for him. So he karate chops her on the neck and she crumples face forward. Well, shit, guess that move really works. He whistles as he picks her up and slings her over his shoulder, taking the low streets back to HQ.

All this trouble for what?

+++

Reno gets the everloving shit kicked out of him for an hour upon his return. It’s somehow more excruciating than the initial two month training. (He’s not allowed to fight back.) It apparently don’t count if she doesn’t come willingly, _whatever the fuck that means._ It’s hard to listen when you keep passing out. Afterward, he’s shoved into a room in the Shinra research laboratory and told to apologize.

The brat sits, swinging her legs off the bed in the room. It’s gray, just like everything in the room except one wall that looks like a rainbow barfed all over it. He vaguely wonders why there’s a bedroom in the Shinra research laboratory at all, but doesn’t actually care. Notices instead the giant square bandage covering half of her forehead, and stuck on the tops of her knees. The bandages have yellow ducks printed on them. Why the fuck does Shinra have yellow duck badages in stock?

She stops swinging her legs when he steps fully into the room, glances at him with a startled look in her eyes that melts into curiosity. And maybe a little guilt. Good.

His body hurts and he’s still bleeding, but no one patched _him_ up with duck bandages.

“What the fuck are you?”

She blinks at him, lips downturned, and sniffs, “I’m Aerith.”

“Okay.” He sits on the bed next to her and it creaks under his weight. She scoots away all the way away from him and averts her gaze. He rolls his eyes, he doesn’t wanna be here looking at her either, so he glances around the room only to realize the rainbow vomit is actually a mural of childish drawings. “You did that?”

She sniffs again.

“S’not bad,” he mutters, trying to focus on the mess of shapes and colors. There’s a lot of animals and a lot of nonsense, but also some things that vaguely look like faces. There’s two with mousy brown hair and green eyes. They look sad. “Listen, I’m sorry for hitting you.”

“No, you’re not.” The disdain in her voice lowers it by a solid octave, and it feels like he’s being scolded by a school teacher. Except she’s fucking nine.

He very nearly laughs, but resists. “No, I’m not. But if I don’t say so I’m gonna get the shit kicked out of me again.”

“Does it hurt much?” Her eyes are like giant green marbles.

“Yeah.”

“Good,” she says viciously, and this time he does laugh. This little shit.

He takes out the last cigarette from his pack—what a waste!—and lights it with an audible click, inhales and lets the nicotine burn at his lungs before remembering what he’s supposed to be doing. “Oops, want a drag?”

She knits her eyebrows together and shakes her head firmly.

“Ah well, your loss.” He takes another drag and then glances over at her. “So what’s an Ancient?”

She sticks her tongue out at him and he’s gonna get a headache from all this eye-rolling.

“S’fine, I heard some things. They’re like aliens right? With voodoo planet powers and junk. So you’re what, the alien princess?”

“I am _not_ an alien!” Indignation pitches her voice higher, and it’s like that banshee wail all over again.

At her screech, the door opens and Tseng pokes his head in. “Everything okay here?” The look on his face means murder, so Reno quickly puts out his cigarette on the bed with a cough.

“All good.” “Tseng!” they say at the same time, but only Reno is taken aback. How does this brat know Tseng? “Can I go home now?” she continues, voice suddenly wibbly and wavering.

Tseng’s eyes soften. They _soften_.“Soon. Reno, a word?”

Reno shambles into the hallway, hands in his pockets, as Tseng shuts the door behind them. He sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Did you even _read_ the file?”

“I skimmed it.”

“Did you skim the part about _keeping her safe at all costs_?”

“Maybe.”

Tseng sighs again and pokes Reno hard in the chest. It makes him burp up blood. “Listen, you’re young, and clearly stupider than we thought—did you really think we’d bring you into the Turks just because of some sticky fingers?”

N…o…?

“We recruited you because we thought you were better than this.” That knocks the wind clean out of him. His body is one thing, but this hurts his fucking pride. “We recruited you _for_ this mission. We needed someone younger, someone closer to her age who could disarm her. But smart enough to throw down should shit hit the fan. You’d know all that if you bothered reading the mission brief.”

“All right, all right, I’m sooooorry.”

“You’re not, and that’s the problem. You need to get her to trust you, to care about you.” Tseng’s face twists into something akin to regret. “Like your life depends on it.”

He finally catches on. “Because it does, huh?” Should’ve read the goddamn report.

“If anyone else had caught you both today…” He shakes his head and doesn’t finish the thought. “Take her home. And make sure she doesn’t get a single other scratch on her.”

Like his life depends on it.

When Tseng leaves, he kicks the door of the room open, making her fall clean off the bed and onto her butt. He smirks. “All right, let’s get going, Alien Princess.”

She scowls at him.

+++

She doesn’t say a word the entire way back, which suits him just fine. Until she stops just before the pathway to her house and turns the most sour look at him.

“ _What?_ ”

“Groceries.” She crosses her tiny arms over her chest. “It was for dinner.”

“So what?”

“So, I’m hungry. And Mom needs groceries for dinner.”

“All right so go get ’em.” He shrugs and turns his back on her. “Later.”

“Didn’t Tseng tell you not to let a scratch on me?” Her voice sounds far too innocent. He wheels around just in time to see her making a fist at a concrete wall, rearing it straight back to—

_Geezus._ He takes her by the wrists and picks her bodily off the ground as she flails and scrambles in the air. “All right, all right. We’ll look for your damn groceries.”

The alleyway where he kidnapped her is completely barren. Of course. Nothing worth anything stays safe in the slums for long.

“Sorry, _Princess_. Maybe if I didn’t have the shit kicked out of me for an hour cuz of you,” he’s still mad about it, “we could have salvaged it.”

She puts her hands on her hips and inhales like she’s about to scream, but holds her breath in and _menaces_ him with her eyes. The worst part is, it works. Fucking…

Reno has just enough money to pay for another set of groceries at the shop, so long as he forgoes dinner tonight, and the grocery clerk tweaks the brat on the nose and offers her a sweet. “Don’t lose it this time, y’hear?”

“I won’t, Mr. Gilly!” she sing-songs, but instead of handing her the basket, the clerk presses it into Reno’s hands instead.

“I’m not sure what kinda scrape you two were just in, but thanks for taking care of Aerith. Here’s a little something for your trouble.” Mr. Gilly shoots him a hesitant smile before slipping something into his jacket pocket. He also offers Reno a sweet.

He crunches on it all the way back to her house, the basket slung onto his arm, as the brat makes sounds of displeasure.

“You’re not supposed to chew it!”

_Crunch crunch_ , he replies.

He shoves the basket into her arms when they reach the path to her house, which is honestly a goddamn mansion for the slums. She has a waterfall in her backyard for crying out loud.

The brat takes two steps forward, then glances back at him with her bottom lip caught between her teeth and her eyebrows knit together in frustration. She comes right up to him, looks him in the eye and says, firmly, “Thank you,” before skittering home. He watches her the entire way until the door shuts behind her.

It must have killed her to say it, especially because she has no reason to. This entire mess is all Reno’s fault, and he’ll own it, has already paid for it, even—with his body _and_ his money. Still, somehow, this kid was raised all right.

_Nothing worth anything stays safe in the slums for too long._

He scratches the back of his head and heads home.

+++

He searches under his bed for the folder with some effort since his shoulder is a mess, flaps it around to get the dust off, and then tosses himself onto the bed as he starts reading from the top.

_Holy shit._

Mission briefs are _so boring_. And he’s starving. And his body hurts. He rolls on his side as his stomach grumbles in protest and something pricks at his hip. Oh, right.

He sits himself upright and takes two square boxes out his jack pocket. It’s a pack of sweets, and a pack of bandages with pink rabbits printed on them.

Welp.

He doesn’t have a mirror in his room, but judging by the clerk’s glance at his face and his parting gifts, it must be decently bad. Reno heads to the communal bathrooms to take a hot shower, and slaps a pink rabbit bandage over one particularly gruesome cut across his right eyebrow, and something pussing yellow under his jaw. “You should see the other guy,” he mutters half-heartedly at the raised eyebrows and snickers from other Shinra grunts he passes on the way back to his room.

He spends the rest of the night pouring over her file and crunching through half the box of sweets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remake spoilers below!!  
> 
> 
> Me: Zack Fair is good boi, best boi. Let's spend over two weeks plotting and writing a 20K love letter to his deserved and destiny-defying happy ending with Aerith and maybe my fannish heart will be content.
> 
> Also me, a day later: But what if Aerith and Reno in the new Remake canon where Zack stays(?) dead. *thinking face emoji*
> 
> LOOK. Square-Enix did NOT have to go so hard in making every character so freaking attractive, giving Reno so much depth and even a conscience, and having his nickname for Aerith be Princess, but they did and they only have themselves to blame.
> 
> I had to split this into two because it's spiraling out of control, but expect some time skips ahead.


	2. No one cares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“How the fuck did you know I was here?”_
> 
> _“Hmmmm.” She presses a finger to her lips and screws her eyebrows together, lowers her voice to deadpan. “It’s classified.”_
> 
> _“That supposed’ta be me?”_
> 
> _“Maybe.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For dreamfighter, the laughing Sephiroth beneath my One Winged Angel.

Old man Shinra is fucking insane. All this trouble for _mako_? The _promised land_? Huh? Reno started the file wondering why the Turks would trust a teenager with this level of detailed classified information, but by the end realized it’s cause no one would believe a goddamn word out of his mouth if he tried to explain even the least stupid part of it all. Also they’d kill him.

No one cares about another dead slum kid, after all.

But the whole thing about her needing to come willingly is maybe the stupidest part. Everything is just so fucking stupid. You want a kid to come back to Shinra Headquarters to lead you to some lala happy land? Spoil the shit out of her. Treat her like the goddamn alien princess she apparently is and don’t lock her in a tiny laboratory room like a rat. _Take her out of the fucking slums._ No one is happy in the fucking slums.

Three weeks of babysitting duty in Sector 5 makes Reno reconsider a little.

Only stupid people are happy in the slums.

And this alien brat is really, really stupid.

She does the same thing every day of her boring life and never once does the dopey smile drop from her face. Wakes up and has breakfast with her mother. Watches her mother leave for work and then gets ready to go outside. Goes to the church with her plastic bottle to water the weeds. Meets the brat pack for some hide and seek, or jump ropes, or when one of them finds some chalk to really spice things up, _hopscotch_. They don’t eat lunch. And then it’s off to the grocery store to pick up a basket of supplies, which is becoming more cans and less fresh produce as the days draw on, before heading home to help her mother prepare a dinner that smells impossibly good and never fails to make Reno’s stomach growl in jealousy and resentment. Finally, a bedtime story and then lights out. Rinse and repeat.

Reno starts smoking more, litters the slums and her roof with his butts.

He’s starting to think it was _more_ dangerous to put him in charge of watching her than just leaving her be. She hasn’t scraped her knees once since they met.

And then something actually happens.

She’s being followed.

And it takes him longer than he’ll ever admit to Tseng to realize it. But when she’s leaving the grocery store and he’s lighting his eighth cigarette of the day, he notices a brown skull cap. It’s stained and it’s the same mousy brown color as her hair, but what really catches his attention is a single perfectly round, cigarette-sized burn in the bottom left corner. It’s the third time he’s seen it today alone.

It’s also way too hot to be wearing a skull cap.

Fuck.

He flicks his cigarette aside and slinks after Skull Cap, who is ambling after the brat with his hands in his pockets. She’s struggling under the weight of the cans in the basket, nearly trips twice so that Skull Cap’s slow, meandering pace catches right up to her real quick. His boots scrape across a patch of stray gravel and the brat stops short, shoulders tense. A can spills out of the basket with a clank and rolls behind her. Three things happen almost simultaneously: Skull Cap reaches out a hand, the brat braces the basket against her chest and attempts to run, but Reno’s the fastest, snags two fingers into the collar of Skull Cap’s gray bomber jacket and _pulls_.

Skull Cap lets out a grunt and the brat shrieks, glances behind her with glassy marble eyes. Frozen.

“Get the fuck outta here!” Reno hollers, distracted and annoyed, as Skull Cap pulls him down and aims a clean shot at his jaw.

He hears her footsteps fade and all he can see are stars as Skull Cap lands another blow on the side of his head, and then another. Fuck this shit. Skull Cap lumbers above with both fists primed to smash over his head, but Reno tucks and rolls, spits blood out the corner of his mouth and then reaches under the back of his suit jacket. He flicks his wrist and his retractable metal rod snaps into place.

“I just want the girl,” Skull Cap rasps, the space between his buck teeth whistling and whining.

“Tough shit.” Reno says, remembering every visceral detail of the beating he got for daring to touch a hair on her head. He flicks a switch and his EMR crackles with electricity as he pays Skull Cap what he received tenfold over.

When he’s done, he snaps his EMR back into itself and replaces it on the holster behind his back, dusts his hands off to get the slum filth off of them. He leans down and spits on the brown skull cap for good spiteful measure and then frowns. Right. The skull cap in summer. The one with the weirdly artful single cigarette burn. Reno toes his shoe under the man’s stomach and kicks upward to roll him over. His gray bomber jacket, drab olive shirt, and blue denim work pants are all dirtied, shredded and torn to give the air of almost tasteful poverty. The face is cleanly shaven and rounded out, without the sharp angles and hollows of a real slummer. On a hunch Reno kneels and lifts the hem of Skull Cap’s shirt.

Tactical military gear, but not just any military. It’s Grade-A Shinra armor.

What the hell…

Reno swallows down the bad taste in the back of his throat and retrieves his cell. “Tseng, requesting back up. Something stinks in Sector 5.”

Tseng is there within the hour, listens to Reno’s report and then kneels and inspects the military gear under the slum costume for himself.

He curses softly under his breath in Wutai. Reno raises his eyebrows.

“Good work,” he says after composing himself, clapping a firm hand over his shoulder. Reno’s heart fills with pride. “Ready for another mission?”

+++

“Why are you on my roof?”

Geezus _FUCK._ Reno almost drops his lighter in surprise, but steels his features neutral as he gazes down on her pale face at the window. “It’s Shinra’s roof,” he replies as lazy smoke curls up toward the underplate. She scowls at him but doesn’t disagree. They both know it’s true.

“…Are you okay?”

“Fuck off.”

He thinks this will be the end of it, but nothing’s gone his way for the past few days so why start now? She shimmies bodily out of the window to full on monkey-climb up the roof toward him. Her bare foot almost slips off a shingle, but she catches herself before Reno has time to react, pulls herself all the way up and sits to his left. He scoots away and she scoots right after him, brings her knees to her chest and wraps her tiny arms around them, hunched together in a pathetic, tiny mess of striped pink pyjamas and wild mousy brown hair. She peers up at him with glassy marbles, and he knows she’s staring under his left eye. “What happened?”

He sighs and moves the cigarette to his right hand.

What happened was a bullet to Skull Cap’s head once he revealed the location of a base hidden underground in the Sector 2 slums.

What happened was a few low-level Shinra suits had worked their way up the ranks until they had access to Shinra weaponry and supplies that were funneled to a group of fringe lunatics who believed mako had the power to cure all the world’s illnesses and suffering or whatever bullshit ideology they peddled in order to enact some kind of revolution.

What happened was Tseng said to stay close to him and the Shinra guards, but Reno veered off a narrow hallway because something sure stunk about it. The hallway was an unbranching pathway with a single door at the end of it. Reno broke the lock and opened the door, and immediately vomited.

What happened was the room was filled with the slumped over bodies of slum kids of all ages trapped in cages, eyes rolled to the backs of their shrunken heads, arms puffy with needle holes, the stale stench of mako sludge and rotting decay in the air. Three, four, seven, eight, twelve bodies. All dead.

He checked every one of them.

What happened was someone in a white lab coat came into the room with a gun, yelling and howling at Reno to back into an open cage with a pile of rags in the corner. Only the pile of rags was a body that groaned and shivered and Lab Coat panicked and shot, giving Reno enough time to pull out his EMR and taze the disgusting motherfucker to the ground.

What happened was the pile of rags was one of the brat pack.

What happened was there was another commotion by the door and Reno didn’t think twice, took the fallen gun and shot the new intruder straight through the heart.

What happened was a flash of metal and Lab Coat pulling at his ankle and, shaking and out of breath, Reno pulled the trigger again. Headshot.

What happened was his tears wouldn’t stop flowing and the boots of Shinra infantrymen were closing in, mixing with the thumping of his own heart in his ears and Reno picked up the fallen knife and dug it under his left eye _to stop the flood_ and let it drop just as someone burst through the door.

What happened was Tseng placing a hand on his shoulder again and saying “Good work,” without even reprimanding him for going off course and not following orders.

What happened was Reno asking if it hadn’t been _her_ , and if he hadn’t noticed the Shinra gear and called it in—what then? Would anyone have noticed?

_No one cares about another dead slum kid, after all._

What happened was Tseng’s initial silence and then, “But it was, and you did. You put an end to this.”

It didn’t make him feel any less like shit.

What happened was slum kids were going missing three at a time, first in Sector 1, then Sector 2, then Sector 3, a goddamn pattern so clear if only anyone had cared to take a fucking look.

What happened was Reno ripping at the bandage and the healing scab under his left eye until it was raw and bleeding all over again.

What happened was Reno begging Tseng to take him off mandatory leave after a single day because every time he closed his eyes, dead slum kids haunted his sleep.

What happened was, “Classified,” he says, flicking his dead cigarette butt off her roof before lighting up another with a clink of his metal lighter.

She doesn’t say anything for a long time after that, just watches him clink his lighter open and closed, open and closed, eyes drooping as the rest of his cigarette burns. “Thank you.”

“Fer what?”

“Saving me from that man in the brown hat.” He notices with a start that she’s not smiling, and the flat line of her mouth seems to age her face entirely. It’s unnerving. He turns away and smokes into the filter, coughs.

“Didn’t do it for you.”

“Still did it.”

Maybe she’s not as stupid as he thought.

“Are you gonna be okay?”

He clicks his lighter shut and lets his cigarette stub fall from his lips. It burns an unartful oval on his suit jacket.

“Gotta keep moving forward.”

+++

Reno doesn’t get assigned another mission for months, but he also stops being resentful about it. To be honest, they’re paying him good money to babysit, and by now most people in Sector 5 know not to mess with him. Or the brat. And if Mr. Gilly wants to slip him the occasional box of sweets on the house, so be it.

He manages three square meals per day and finally stops seeing dead kids in his sleep. Life is good.

And then Tseng calls him outside HQ. “How is the mission?”

“Ancient brat is safe, ain’t she?” Reno realizes too late it’s the wrong answer.

“The real mission, Reno, did you forget?”

“…And if I did?” He puts extra cheek into it. Tseng doesn’t like many people, but somehow has a soft-spot for him that Reno’s not above exploiting.

“Trust, Reno.”

“Wazzat?”

“You’re supposed to make her trust you. So that she will come back to Shinra on her own volition.”

Ah, right, _that_ shit. “Listen, keeping her safe, I get. But how the hell am I supposed to gain her trust enough to leave her mom and all her friends to come with us?”

Tseng’s lips quirk. “That’s _your_ mission to figure out.”

“It’s an impossible one!” Reno whines, but Tseng is already headed back into the building. He takes the impromptu meeting for what it is: A warning.

Reno sighs and his breath fogs in the crisp air. It’s getting cold.

+++

She’s turning ten tomorrow and has been planning a huge to-do about it since the month began, has invited all the brats and confirmed multiple times that they’re coming. Otherwise her life runs exactly on course plus one puffy magenta coat with a faux-fur hood, and the smile on her face is even wider and brighter than ever. It’s apparently the first time she’s having a party. Reno knows because she’s said it about a thousand times already.

The brat pack disperses for the day and like clockwork, she heads toward the grocer’s, but instead of following after her, Reno looms out of the shadows and snags the last remaining brat by the collar of his jacket. He seems like the leader of the group, and Reno thinks they can come to an understanding.

“You want me to _what_?”

Reno’s a little ticked off that the Brat Leader isn’t more afraid of him, so he lights up a cigarette instead of clobbering the little shit stain in the nose. “You heard me.” He leans against rusty slum fencing, hands frozen in his jacket pockets. He needs to buy a warmer coat. “Don’t go to the birthday party. Tell all your friends not to go. Don’t talk to her anymore.”

“ _Why_?” He’s peering up at Reno now, suspicious and intrigued.

“Because I said so, that’s why.” This isn’t going as smoothly as he’d hoped.

“What’s in it for me?” There’s snot dripping down the kid’s nose. Ugh!

“Your life.” Reno casually takes out his retractable EMR and lets it spark.

Brat Leader crosses his arms with a sneer and calls his bluff. “Pfft, you’d be doing me a favor.”

Fucking little shit. “All right, whaddaya want?”

He sniffs snot back up and considers. “I like that lighter of yours.”

“No.”

“Okay, well I guess I’ll tell Aerith that some weirdo with red hair told me not to come to her party or talk to her ever again.”

Reno groans and takes him by the collar as he tries to meander away. “You don’t say another goddamn word to her for the rest of your life,” he hisses through grit teeth, metal like ice against his fingers.

Brat Leader grins and opens his hands wide and expectant.

+++

The party is a flop. Her mother spends the first hour full of forced positivity, reassuring the brat that everyone must just be running late. The second hour finds them silently eating dinner before it gets too cold—although they can definitely warm everything back up when guests start to arrive. By the fourth hour, there’s only the tinny sounds of the radio and of running water. The brat doesn’t want a bedtime story tonight, so her mother’s footsteps fade away and the lights go off in her bedroom.

Silence.

Reno fumbles with a match twice before finally getting a light on his cigarette and breathing easy. It’s about time, his whole body is numb from the cold.

“Smoking is bad for you, you know.” Her head appears at the window and Reno almost falls clean off the roof.

“How the fuck did you know I was here?”

“Hmmmm.” She presses a finger to her lips and screws her eyebrows together, lowers her voice to deadpan. “It’s classified.”

“That supposed’ta be me?”

“Maybe.” She’s not smiling. “Did you know it’s my birthday?”

For the love of god, who didn’t? “Good for you.”

“We had a party,” she continues without looking at him, turning her face toward the winking lights on the underside of the plate. “Do you want some cake?”

“Do _I_ look ten?”

She blinks, and it takes her far too long to answer. Reno scowls—people have been underestimating him all his life. Just because he’s a little short… “No, you don’t,” she says finally, and her head disappears from the window.

Fucking finally.

Only to reappear a few minutes later with something that smells suspiciously like chocolate and spices. She eases out of the window with one hand holding a plate with a giant slice of cake and a fork sticking straight out of the top, a fluffy pink blanket under her arm, and climbs up the roof with decent effort. But then the blanket unravels a bit and her foot gets tangled and she nearly plummets straight to the ground if not for Reno reaching over and catching her by the armpit. The fork clatters onto the pavement in front of her house as he pulls her up.

“Th…thanks,” she says a little breathlessly, handing him the plate and peering over the roof with a grimace. “I might have become a pancake.”

“You won’t if you stop climbing rooftops to talk to strangers.”

“You’re not a stranger,” she mutters, laying the blanket over her shoulders and tucking the ends over the entire front of her body like a pink burrito. “And you’re technically the only person who came to my party.”

“Uninvited.”

“Where would I have sent your invite?” She frowns at him and he blinks. He doesn’t have an answer so he continues to puff at his cigarette and tries not to shiver.

“You know what I wished for when I blew out the candles?” _Puff puff._ “I wished I wasn’t so weird. Then maybe everyone would have come to my party.”

He refuses to feel guilty. “Tough shit, Alien Princess. That’s life.”

“When’s your birthday, Reno?”

That’s definitely, “Classified.” He shifts in place to work out the kinks in his back and something sharp jabs at his side. Oh. It’s a box of half-eaten sweets. He digs into his pocket to fish one out and tosses it over. She catches it with both hands flailing out of her blanket, eyes wide and lips pursed. She leans in closer.

“Did you get tattooed?”

“God, you’re nosy,” he wheezes finally, unable to contain himself. She looks almost triumphant as she opens the sweet and pops it into her mouth.

“Did it hurt much?”

“Yeah.” Especially under the left eye.

“Why both?” Because there were two shots.

He doesn’t reply. She bites down on the candy with a solid crunch.

“I thought you weren’t supposed to chew it.”

_Crunch crunch_ , she replies.

The cake is fucking delicious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yikes, no I don't know where that first part came from, but I, uh, yeah. 
> 
> I swear this was supposed to be a two-shot (well, actually it was supposed to be a oneshot), but the more I let this story breathe the more it seeps into my brain and does this. But I'm having fun with it and hope y'all still are too! I promise an actual time skip next time and new face.


	3. The best way to gain trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Why did you start wearing your shirt open like that?”_
> 
> _“It’s sweltering up here, whaddaya want?” It’s certainly not because he’s been training hard with Rude for the past few months and he’s proud of himself or something._
> 
> _“Is it cause you wanna tan? You’re so pale.”_
> 
> _“Oh my god if you don’t shut up and let me sleep, I’m going to push you off the rafters.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For dreamfighter, the remake to my trash. <3

After nearly a year, Reno finally gets a mission that lives up to the Department of Administrative Research’s name. Things aren’t going well in Wutai and Shinra is massively understaffed. Or something. Reno is only half paying attention the day Tseng hands him a tall stack of transcripts and an entire box of multi-colored highlighters.

“When d’ya need ’em by?” The stack is half as tall as he is.

“Yesterday.” Tseng’s lips are a hard, flat line and Reno takes the hint to treat this seriously.

So he pulls an all-nighter in the Shinra HQ library and pores over every line twice, highlighting anything that seems remotely suspicious or malicious in any way, and cross-referencing files with every book the library has to offer about Wutai. He fills an entire notebook with chicken scratch conspiracy theories. By the time the sun filters through the cracked shades of the library windows, Reno is on his sixth cup of shitty vending machine coffee and has officially gone fucking insane.

He spent the last hour seeing meaning in every word and highlighting every line of every page and now he realizes that the baker and the pharmacist were probably actually just talking about bread shaped like melons and _not_ mechanical explosives. And the worst part is, the bread apparently doesn’t even taste like melons, either, what the fuck. Reno sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose, presses his eyes shut and resists the incredible urge to fall asleep.

And fails. And dreams of bread in the shape of melons being tossed into a giant spiraling fountain. He recognizes it as the one in the center of Wutai’s main square, from the war propaganda video he dug up in the film archives. When Reno peers into the fountain, there is, beneath each piece of melon-shaped bread, a subsequently larger piece of melon-shaped bread. It’s melon all the way down…

Reno wakes to the smell of Tseng’s fancy pour over coffee—which just smells like regular shitty coffee with a splash of vanilla—and the sound of his own stomach grumbling. He’s got a headache, which might have to do with the fact that he’s facedown on a library table. He sits up and rubs at his eyes and his temples and frowns at the sight of Tseng looking the same as ever, not a crease in his suit and not a hair out of place.

“Good morning.”

“I thought we were understaffed,” Reno mutters darkly. “Why didn’t _you_ pull an all nighter.”

“I did.” It might be the lack of sleep, but it almost looks like the corners of his mouth are twitching upward. Tseng then pours some coffee from his personal thermos into one of the many empty paper cups littering the table, before tossing over a greasy paper bag with the Shinra cafeteria logo on it. It contains a strawberry frosted donut with sprinkles that’s probably one of the worst things Reno has ever tasted. It’s also his favorite.

“You’re my hero,” he says, stuffing half the donut into his mouth with a grateful sigh. He chokes on the last bite and then nearly scalds his tongue trying to wash it down with the coffee.

This time Tseng absolutely smirks, but quickly hides it behind a sip from his thermos. “So, did you find anything?” He flips through the last of the files that Reno has completely highlighted in pink.

“No, not there.” He picks sprinkles from his teeth with his pinky as he surveys the library table, and then grimaces because apparently past Reno decided to make like a million little piles of files during his slow descent into madness. In addition to the piles, multiple reference books are opened haphazardly and a few even have brown ring stains on the edges. There’s something on the tip of his tongue, though, but it’s slowly spinning away like water into a fountain pump—

“Blue…” Reno mutters, and then searches the piles for his blue highlighter period. It takes him several tries before he finds a few pages from December; a conversation between the grocer and the baker’s wife. He quickly scans the lines until he spots a single blue-highlighted passage, points it out in triumph. “It’s melons all the way down.”

Tseng blinks. “What?”

“What?” Reno coughs. “I mean. They’re talking about what’s on sale.”

“And?”

And—is a good question. Why the fuck had he highlighted this? “It sounds weird?”

“It might be a mistranslation.”

Reno shakes his head with a frown. “No, no. Why are they even talking about melons in the winter? They’re not in season.”

“Perhaps why prices are down.” But even Tseng’s voice lifts as if in question.

“That makes even less sense.” Reno scowls and stares at the words until they’re swimming on the backs of his eyelids…

Swimming…

“Hey, what’s that old Wutai myth about Gaia existing on top of a…”

“Turtle,” Tseng finishes, eyes sharp.

“Melons all the way down,” Reno mutters, shaking his head. “Sorry, I guess it was nothing after all.”

Tseng collects the scattered files and gives him a once over. “Go home and get some sleep. But be sure to check up on Aerith first.” Reno groans. “ _After_ you clean up the mess you’ve made in the library.” Reno groans harder.

+++

He can’t believe he’s still on babysitting duty after all that, except of course he can because, and he can even hear Tseng’s robot voice in his ears, _Turks don’t take breaks._ Luckily the brat’s been splitting her time between foraging in the slums for loose scrap materials and spending all day at the church weaving baskets for the various Sector 5 merchants—and today is a church day. Reno has just enough time to grab a stale donut from the only stall open this early in the morning, before catching sight of a swishing brown braid down the pathway toward the church. He tails her all the way to the church’s double doors before slinking around the back entrance and making his way up a dilapidated set of stairs that open up to the roof rafters. The rafters are old, but sturdy, and wide enough for him to comfortably sprawl out against, so he can keep an eye on her while she putters around the main room all day. No one ever comes into the church, the doors creak loud enough to wake the dead, and it’s so warm up in the rafters that Reno thinks, after he polishes off the donut and smokes his first cigarette of the day, maybe it’ll be okay to take a quick nap.

So he does. And wakes to the sound of her screaming his name like a bloody banshee.

“Reno! _Reno_!”

Reno jolts awake, falls right off the rafter and only barely manages to tuck and roll so that he lands on his butt and not his neck. Stands and whips out his EMR, snaps it open and has it crackling within seconds, ready to go.

“What are you doing!” she demands, scowling up at him from where she’s kneeling on the floor.

“What are _you_ doing?” he snipes back, realizing they’re in an empty church with not a single other soul in sight. He shuts off the EMR with a sad sizzle and taps it against his shoulder. “Why were you screaming—wait, how do you always know I’m here?”

She crosses her arms over her chest and stares pointedly at his shoe. “Watch the flower!”

“Watch the what?” He blinks and follows her gaze down to his shoe, and then realizes she’s not really looking at it. Just in front of him is a tiny golden bud, barely blooming from the cracks of the floorboards, from the depths of overgrown moss. It’s so…small. So pathetic. He could probably crush it with a sneeze, let alone his feet. But the sight of it gives him pause. When’s the last time he’s seen a flower still attached to the dirt? He takes a step back and shakes his head. “Shit.”

“Told you it could grow.”

_Nothing worth anything can grow in the slums without the sun, huh?_

Reno looks up and squints against a sliver of dying sunlight filtering in from the hairspace between the metal underplate and through the tiny rotting holes in the church roof. How could he have never noticed it in all the time he spent up in the rafters?

He glances at her and she smiles smugly, stands and stretches her arms over her head with a yawn. She’s no longer half his size. And growing magic flowers in the middle of the fucking slums. What was he even _doing_ at eleven—prowling the Loveless Theater and mugging rich people?

…Man, life used to suck.

His phone vibrates in his pocket and he answers without looking; only two people have his number. And only one calls. “Yo.”

“Turtle’s Paradise.”

Reno furrows his eyebrows. “The Wutai bar?”

“They’ve built an underground bunker that tunnels out into one of the neighboring villages for supplies.”

“A secret base beneath a bar? Cliché much?”

Tseng snorts. He _snorts._

“Did you just—”

A cough. “Anyway, good work, Reno. Report back to HQ for more files.”

“Oh, joy.” He flips his phone shut and glances back at the brat, who’s looking up into the rafters, pretending as if she hasn’t been straining to eavesdrop the entire time. “Duty calls. Time to go, Alien Princess.”

“Don’t _call_ me that!” She stomps her feet and Reno smirks while lighting up a cigarette.

“Hey, watch the flower!”

Her hands fly over her mouth, immediately chagrined—before realizing her feet are nowhere near it. She glowers at him and the sight is worth carrying all her stupid little baskets back to the marketplace after her.

+++

It’s summer when Reno and Tseng are called into the HQ training room with no warning. The air conditioning has been on the fritz and it’s sweltering as they await Veld’s return. Sweat drips from the goggles atop his forehead and down his chin as he undoes the third button of his shirt and rolls his sleeves above his elbows, his jacket long since tossed onto the floor. He knows it’s bad because even Tseng’s tie is askew from discomfort, and his hair is tied back and clinging to the nape of his neck. Reno’s about to work on his fourth button when Veld finally waltzes in, perfectly composed. He’s followed by some tan bald dude in a black suit. A Turks suit. He’s also wearing sunglasses and scuffed black leather gloves.

“Meet our newest recruit,” Veld says, motioning the man further into the room. “Go on, introduce yourself.”

“…Rude.”

“Sheesh, touchy,” Reno mutters under his breath. An eyebrow raises from beneath the sunglasses.

“No, that’s his name.”

“That’s a _name_?”

Tseng clears his throat before rising to shake Rude’s hand firmly. Reno remembers that death grip. “Nice to meet you, Rude.” He tightens his grip and then, pleasantly, with the barest undertone of annoyance, adds to Veld, “But why haven’t I heard anything about a new recruit?”

“We need the manpower, Tseng.” Veld’s tone leaves no room for discussion.

“And training?”

“Yeah, what about training!” Reno heckles from the back, remembering his torturous first two months. Tseng shoots him an impatient look.

“Well.” Veld shrugs and takes a step back. Rude brings his other hand over Tseng’s and then Tseng is suddenly tossed behind him with a startled grunt. And if that wasn’t hilariously embarrassing enough, Rude then takes Tseng by the ankles and spins him around twice before chucking him clear across the training room to land ungracefully in a heap of mats in the corner, very narrowly missing Reno’s head.

“So, training?” Veld repeats lightly.

“Unnecessary,” is Tseng’s one-word reply, his hand waving in defeat.

Reno howls with laughter.

Rude is, plainly put, the coolest motherfucker Reno has ever met.

+++

The two of them are given a new mission, rather, a “new-ish” mission. Technically they’re both on babysitting duty now—which seems a pretty solid waste of Rude’s talents all things considered—but with a secondary objective: Obtain a sample of the Ancient’s blood every month.

“Why?” Reno questions when Veld first gives them the assignment.

Veld is not a man of many expressions, something Reno clocked Tseng seeming to take great pains to emulate and something that otherwise seems to come naturally to Rude, but the corners of his mouth slip. “Hojo.”

Reno shivers involuntarily. He’s always hated that creep. “So, how’re we supposed to get that?”

Veld’s lips return to their impassive state. “That’s your mission to figure out.”

“I’m getting real sick of those two,” Reno grumbles when Veld is out of earshot. Rude doesn’t respond, is meticulously reading the new file he’s just been given.

“So, any thoughts?” Reno asks, propping his chin against his hands, elbows leaning against his desk.

Rude flips a page.

“The brat’s been keeping a pretty consistent schedule of going to the church every few days.” Flip. “And no one else ever goes there, but…” He trails off with a frown.

Flip.

“We’re supposed to keep her safe at all costs, so how the fuck are we supposed to get her blood without hurting her?” He’ll be damned if he takes another beating for her ass.

Rude flips the folder shut and glances at Reno through his shades. Rude is cool and all, but he’s also a fucking weirdo just like the rest of ’em—why wear sunglasses indoors? “We ask.”

Reno’s elbow slips clean off the table in surprise, head jolting down before he snaps it up to stare back at Rude. “What?”

“We ask.”

“Did you not just read the entirety of that dumbass file? You think I never just thought of _asking_? You think in the depths of my despair and boredom I haven’t begged and pleaded with that little shit to just come back to Shinra with assurances that she would live like goddamn royalty? But noooooo she has to come here of her own free will, and that includes _not_ being allowed to threaten her or anyone she loves! Because that would be _coercion_.” He is absolutely mimicking Tseng’s stupid robot voice in the end.

Rude raises his eyebrows.

Reno huffs and tosses his hands up in annoyance. “Fine! You go do that! But I’m gonna say I fucking told you so, later!”

+++

“Wait, you meant ask her _mom_?” Reno chortles as he follows Rude down the path toward the brat’s house. It’s Sunday, which means Elmyra Gainsborough is off from work and the two of them will spend all day indoors, laughing and puttering about and usually baking something that makes Reno’s stomach twist in envy. Eventually Reno decided Sundays should be his day off as well, so he’s doubly annoyed when Rude wakes him up at noon by showing up unannounced at his apartment with only a leather suitcase in hand. He could have at least brought coffee. Actually, he could have at least answered when Reno asked what was in the suitcase like fifteen times. He no longer wonders why his name is Rude. “I hope she slams the door in your face,” he mutters darkly to himself, since he doesn’t expect Rude to reply.

Rude doesn’t. But neither does Elmyra Gainsborough immediately slam the door in their faces when he knocks. Instead, she peers at them through the crack of the doors, still chained in place, gives Rude a once over before glancing behind him and fixing her gaze on Reno.

“May I help you, gentlemen?” she asks tersely, though politely.

Rude glances back at him and Reno sticks out his tongue before crossing his arms. This wasn’t _his_ plan.

Just ask…ha!

Rude clears his throat and then reaches up to remove the sunglasses from his face and places them neatly in the breast pocket of his jacket.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Gainsborough. My name is Rude, and I believe you know my associate, Reno. I believe you also know that we are with Shinra.”

Oh, _now_ this motherfucker can talk.

Elmya blinks, clearly taken aback, but when she replies it’s all saccharine fire. “And what, praytell, do you want with me Misters…Rude and Reno?”

“We’d like to discuss a proposition regarding your daughter, Aerith Gainsborough—”

“No, thank you, good day Mr. Rude!” Elmyra says forcefully, reaching down to slam the door in his face. It doesn’t budge. Rude’s foot keeps it open.

“We would appreciate it if you could hear us out before coming to a decision.”

“I won’t let you hurt her.” Elmyra’s voice drops fiercely, and Rude shakes his head.

“We wouldn’t dare try.”

“And why should I believe you?”

“Has she come to any harm by our hands since she’s been in your care?” Rude asks lightly. Elmyra seems to wrestle with that. Reno feels her gaze in his periphery and staunchly ignores it as he glances at the water cascading behind the house, trying to hide his smug smile. “All I ask is that you hear us out, and after that, if you’d like us to leave, we will. Posthaste. You have my word.”

“And should the word of a Turk mean anything to us?”

Her question lingers in the air a second too long without an answer. The door closes on Rude’s face and Reno readies his most obnoxious _I told you so_ voice. But then there’s the clinking of metal and the door opens wide in front of them. “We were just about to sit down to eat. It’s not much, but there’s plenty if you’d like to join us as we discuss.”

“I would be much obliged.” Rude tips his head and follows her through the doors. “You keep a lovely home.” Their voices disappear into the house.

What…the…fucking… _fuck._

Reno could absolutely use a cigarette right about now, but before he can catch a light, there’s a new voice at the door.

“Mom’s stew is the best.” The brat stands in the doorway with eyes narrowed and hands on her hips. “I’m hungry.”

“So?”

“So, hurry up!”

He wants to tell her to fuck right off into her waterfall, but his stomach decides to grumble painfully loud at that moment. And the scent of stew wafting out the door somehow smells better than anything he can get topside.

“Yeah, all right,” he replies begrudgingly, sticking his unlit cigarette behind his ear.

+++

The stew is fucking delicious, but Reno refrains from asking for seconds, although he does snag the last roll of bread without remorse. Rude wipes at his mouth daintily with a cloth napkin, folds it into fourths onto the table, and then nods at Elmyra.

“I’ll get straight to the point, Mrs. Gainsborough,” Rude starts, glancing between her and the brat in turn. “Shinra would like access to Aerith’s blood, just a single vial per month.”

Elmyra’s spoon clatters into her bowl. “And what are you doing to do with it?”

“That would be classified.” The brat groans and makes a big show of rolling her eyes as she licks her bowl clean.

“Then why should we agree to this?”

Rude folds his hands together, rests them against his chin. “You know that Shinra always gets what it wants.”

“I know that she has to come willingly, or whatever it is Shinra _wants_ won’t happen.”

“There are…” Reno frowns and seems to find himself at a loss for words. Elmyra stares at him impassively and Reno rolls his eyes and cuts in, “Look, there are lunatics in Shinra that care less about what the president wants and more about being an insane psychopath, and giving him some of her blood every month is probably better than letting him go stir crazy in a laboratory full of really bad shit.”

It’s apparently not the right thing to say. Elmyra’s eyes harden and she tosses her napkin onto the table in disgust. “And that’s exactly why I won’t ever let you take her back—how am I supposed to trust she’ll return in one piece if there are _lunatics in Shinra_?”

“We won’t be taking her,” Rude finds his voice, and then lifts his suitcase onto the edge of the table, undoes the latches and opens it toward them. Inside is an assortment of medical supplies sealed up in sterilized plastic. “Once a month, we come to you, draw a single vial of blood, and then we’re on our way.”

Elmyra narrows her eyes at the instruments and then back at Rude. “No taking her?”

“No taking her.”

“And no catch?”

“No catch.”

“Will it hurt?” It’s the brat who asks, eyes wide and glassy green.

Rude shakes his head. “I’ll do my best.”

“Aerith…”

“Okay,” she sniffs and rolls up a sleeve. “But pie, first.”

+++

Nearly an entire pie and a single vial of Ancient blood later, Rude snaps up his suitcase, replaces his sunglasses, and bids the Gainsboroughs farewell as they leave the house that smells too much like a home. Reno lights a cigarette once they’re back on the main streets of the Sector 5 slums, breathes in deeply and then glances sidelong at Rude. Blows smoke at him. “Well, look at you. Just a few days into the job and you’ve already drawn blood.” It’s stupid because, really, Reno’s the one who gains the most from this arrangement. He can spend less time babysitting and more time doing literally anything else, and he didn’t even have to get his ass beat, either. And yet—

It’s stupid, but he feels like shit because, well, this wasn’t his plan. “And all you had to do was ask, geezus fuck.”

“The best way to gain trust is transparency.” Reno raises an eyebrow. He’s still not over Rude suddenly becoming the life of the fucking party. “And the best lies are grounded in some truth.”

“Whatever.”

“You seem mad.”

“I’m _not_ mad.”

Rude stops and lowers his gaze, glances at Reno over his shades. “Aerith doesn’t like needles.”

“Yeah, well who the fuck would?” A memory of a dark room lined with cages surges unbidden and the unpleasant combination of too much stew and pie rises up the back of his throat. Reno swallows it all down and chokes on smoke.

“She was looking at you the entire time she was getting her blood drawn.”

“Yeah, she was scowling at me.”

“You were scowling at her.”

“And?” Rude’s testing his patience right now.

“And do you always keep sweets in your pocket to give to her?”

“I didn’t give it to her—she _snatched_ it before I put it in my mouth.” Reno tosses his hands up in annoyance. “What does this have to do with anything, anyway?! Geezus, I’m starting to miss when you didn’t talk so damn much.”

Rude opens his mouth, and then shuts it, and then looks conflicted for a just a second before he tilts his shades back in place. “It was a good distraction.”

“Great! _You’re welcome_. Glad all the time I spent busting my ass for this job could lead to the opportunity to be a _good distraction_.”

“Do I really need to spell it out for your self-pitying ass?”

Reno blinks, mouth agape.

“Turks always get the job done, right?”

He frowns and nods.

“So _why_ do you think they still keep you around?” Rude walks briskly ahead, not a crease in his Turks uniform, the briefcase in his hand a sign of another job done. Their job done. Reno’s lips twist funny at that.

“Hey, wait up!”

+++

“Reno?” He doesn’t even bother cracking an eye open, has long since given up wondering how she always manages to find him, has long since given up trying to scare her away from hanging around rooftop rafters with black collar criminals. She just calls him a hypocrite, anyway, and he still hasn’t come up with a good comeback to that. Best to ignore her.

“Why did you start wearing your shirt open like that?”

“It’s sweltering up here, whaddaya want?” It’s certainly not because he’s been training hard with Rude for the past few months and he’s proud of himself or something.

“Is it cause you wanna tan? You’re so pale.”

“Oh my god if you don’t shut up and let me sleep, I’m going to push you off the rafters.”

“That sounds like a threat.” He sneers. “I’m calling Tseng.” His eyes balloon wide open and he’s upright instantly, turns to find her with her thumb and pinky cradling her ear. She sticks her tongue out at him. “I don’t have a cell phone, dummy.”

“You little…”

The door to the church creaks open then, followed by a slow and familiar gait. Reno sighs. So much for the nap. He swings his legs over the rafters, ducks his head to greet his partner with a two-fingered salute. “Yo, Rude.”

Rude walks further into the church and adjusts his sunglasses as he peers up at them. “How was the nap?”

“Nonexistent.”

“And Aerith?”

“Yo, Rude!” She pokes her head into view and swings her legs next to Reno’s, mimicking his salute to a tee. Cheeky little shit.

“Glad to see you’re well.” Rude nods at her before turning to Reno. “We’ve got a new mission.”

“All right, time to go, Princess.”

“I said stop calling me—eep!” she shrieks as he tosses her over his shoulder and leaps straight to the ground, landing easily on his feet. She kicks him in the gut in her struggle to get free and he hisses and yanks on her braid, making her fall flat on her butt.

Rude takes a step back, eyebrows raised over his shades, and they react instantaneously. “Hey! Watch the flowers!”

He blinks and glances behind him, stares and then removes his sunglasses to get a better look. “Well, I’ll be…”

After another year, a single flower has bloomed into a whole garden.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UM. Let's ignore how bad I am with chapter projection and talk about how I've always been fond of Reno, but it took Remake (and fandom) to really get me to like all the Turks and now I love them??? And this is now officially a Reno origin story with a side of Aerith/Turks, hey. 
> 
> Also I'm sorry for the attempt at """espionage""" at the top.


	4. The bad guys (duh)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Your hair’s getting long. You should do something with it. Like tie it. Or…braid it!”_
> 
> _“I’d sooner shave my head.”_
> 
> _“Liar. You care so much about your appearance.” Her fingers tug insistently on his scalp and he hisses. “See, your roots are showing.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello and oh geez, it’s been a while, huh? You can blame a quick detour to write some self-indulgent shippy things, a parade of new gaming addictions (currently evo-grinding my soul away in Guardian Tales) and my finding a new job that starts at the end of this month! Huzzah!
> 
> But before we dive in, I just wanted to thank everyone who’s left such lovely comments on this truly random Reno story. You’re absolutely ~~to blame for this nonsense growing to six chapters~~ the reason I knew I had to come back and finish this out instead of just, uh, fucking off into a new fandom fling like I usually do. So thank you so much and hope you continue to enjoy the ride!! <3 
> 
> For dreamfighter, the coffee grinder to my stamina. <3

“New mission,” Tseng announces, smacking the brief against Reno’s chest as he enters the office. Reno scowls and reaches for the folder, only for Tseng to swipe it up and over his head, handing it off to Rude, who enters right behind him.

“What gives?” He rubs at his smarting chest as Rude continues toward his desk. Sets his thermos and the folder neatly on top of it. Rolls his chair out. Spins it ninety degrees clockwise. Eases himself into it, holding the bottom of his suit jacket so it doesn’t crease. Spins himself ninety degrees counterclockwise. And then. Takes a sip of tea. Rude’s every movement is always very deliberate and very, very annoying.

“Will you open the fucking folder already?”

Rude ignores him, but does, finally, open the fucking folder already. A single eyebrow raises from behind his shades. “SOLDIER recruitment in Mideel?”

Reno peers over his shoulder to skim the contents of the first page with similar disbelief. “Since when do we vet potential SOLDIER candidates?”

“We do everything that needs to be done.”

“Seems like _we’re_ the ones hurting for help, am I right?” Reno smirks, clapping a hand over Rude’s shoulder and leaning his whole body weight against it. Rude ignores them both and flips the page.

“There’s plenty of us.”

“There’s _four_ of us.”

“Just because you haven’t met other Turks doesn’t mean they don’t exist,” Tseng replies blandly, even as Reno’s mind combusts a little at that. In all honesty he’d never truly considered there might be more Turks than the daily inhabitants of this office, despite all the clandestine and classified bullshit they’re always knee-deep in. “The helicopter will be ready in ten minutes.”

Rude bats Reno’s hand away and carefully replaces all the contents back into the folder. Stands and and tucks it under his arm. Takes another sip of tea. “Roger.”

“Wait, but how are _we_ supposed to vet ’em. Don’t they gotta be, like, stupid strong to be considered for SOLDIER?”

“ _You_ won’t have to worry about that.” Tseng motions toward Rude as if the answer is obvious, and okay, it is, but then why the fuck did Reno crawl out of bed early for this?

“Then why the fuck did I crawl out of bed early for this?”

“Someone’s gotta fly the helicopter.”

The thermos hits the floor first, splattering tea all over the floor and the folder with a clang. “…Wait, _Reno_ —?”

“You’re not joking are you? Tell me you’re not fucking joking.”

“I’m not fucking joking,” Tseng repeats with a smirk, and Reno howls with laughter.

“Ho—ly shit, Tseng, you beautiful sonuvabitch. Partner, let’s fucking goooo!”

+++

Mideel is located on an island due south and slightly east off the coast of the continent, and is completely surrounded by thick forests, so it’s not remotely Reno’s fault that they have such a janky landing. “All I promised was getting us here in one piece,” he quips as he shuts off the engine and motions to their fully intact bodies. “See, one piece.” Rude doesn’t reply, just unbuckles his seatbelt and stares unblinkingly through his shades. “What?” He glances down at his suit jacket. It takes Reno a bit of squinting to realize that there are some faint wrinkles in it.

“You’re not really mad about a few wrinkles, are you?” Reno laughs nervously, because he and Rude have come to a pretty good understanding over the past few years of partnership—but in the back of Reno’s head lives the delightful memory of Rude tossing Tseng clear across the training room. “Partner?”

Rude slams the door behind him and walks off toward the forest without a single backward glance.

“Oh come the fuck on, really? You gonna be this big mad when your face is full of ’em too?!”

Rude flips him the bird.

By the time Reno finds his way into Mideel through the twisting, forking forest pathways, the sun is burning high in the sky and Rude is nowhere to be seen. Not that Reno really gives a shit—he’s the one with the keys after all. He twirls them around his pointer finger and decides that his first order of business is to completely forget his partner’s existence and get a goddamn drink.

“Hey, are you friends with that guy who just came in here?”

Ugh. “What’s it to ya?”

The buzzing annoyance is a kid in an oversized flat cap that nearly covers his entire face. “Well, it’s just that we don’t get many visitors here…and you’re wearing similar clothes.”

“Were there wrinkles in his jacket?”

“Er, I didn’t really notice. Are wrinkles something to consider in your line of work?”

Reno snorts, considers lighting up a cigarette, but runs his tongue over dry, cracked lips and decides against it for now. “I like you kid, what’s your name?”

“Oh, it’s—”

“Great. Say, kid, where’s the nearest bar?” He’s not really sure how long a SOLDIER assessment should take, but he probably has time for a drink. Or two. Or whatever the fuck he wants. _Keys._

“We’ve got one place that serves alcohol…but it’s not even noon. And…you don’t look old enough.”

“And just how old do I look?” He bares his teeth, which is usually enough to get even the dirtiest thugs crowing with information. But this kid barely bats an eyelash, so to speak since Reno can’t _see_ his eyes.

“The drinking age here is twenty-one. And they’re real strict about it. Real good at spotting fake IDs, too.” He pauses thoughtfully. “And didn’t you drive?”

“How could you possibly know _that_?”

He points to Reno’s hand. “Keys.”

“Ugh.” He could probably get away with punching this smartass kid in the dick, but the future paperwork easily outweighs any immediate satisfaction.

“Nana’s Diner over there will spike your milkshake with some Hyper if you ask for the Mideel Migraine Special, though. They don’t ask questions. And it’ll probably help with the driving.” He grins into the brim of the cap. “It always helped right before exam season.”

Useful enough to avoid that dick punching, then. “All right, thanks for the tip. Later.” Reno pivots on his heel and saunters in the direction of diner, leaving a clear two-fingered salute of dismissal in his wake. So of course this kid decides to follow.

“Wait!” UGH. “You never really answered my question. So _are_ you friends with that guy?”

“Kid, if you don’t leave—” “Rudolph Callahan, right?”

Reno freezes in mid-step. “Sorry, huh?”

“Rudolph Callahan? Bald guy with sunglasses? It’s been a while, but I could have sworn that was Dr. Callahan’s kid.”

“Bald guy with sunglasses.” A nod. “And his name is Rudolph. Callahan.” Another nod. “Rudolph.” A third, tentative nod. “RUDOLPH?” Reno doesn’t care that he’s just let out the most unattractive, bone-deep cackle from within the pits of his blackened soul. “Ho—ly shit, first the chopper and now this? This is the best day of my goddamn life. Kid, tell me everything you know about Rudolph,” he nearly chokes on his glee, “fucking Callahan.”

+++

It’s still before the noon lunch rush, according to the kid, so the diner is fairly empty when they get seated, and the service impeccable. Reno’s on his second strawberry Mideel Migraine Special by the time the tinkling of wind chimes signals a new arrival at the entrance. Rude spots him immediately, frowns and walks briskly toward his booth. Stands on the opposite side and adjusts his shades. Waits. Reno rolls his eyes.

“Hey partner, how’d you find me?”

The barest flash of razor straight teeth. “I asked about a loudmouth redhead in a wrinkled suit.”

“Funny, that’s the same exact thing I said about you.” He dips a fry into the shake and pops it into his mouth. “You know, just the wrinkled part. Cause of the no hair and all.”

A grunt.

“So we got ourselves a new SOLDIER candidate or what?”

“He said he was a specialist in Zangan-Ryu.”

“And?”

He cracks his knuckles one by one. “He was not.”

“Whoa, so you guys work with SOLDIERS, huh?”

Rude’s lips twitch as he peers over the edge of the booth and finally notices that they have company. His eyebrows knit together sharply. “…Runel’s younger brother.”

“You remembered me! Wow! So do you work for Shinra or something? You must if you get to work with SOLDIERs! Is Sephiroth really as cool as everyone makes him out to be?”

“…”

“Yer just another brat who dreams of being a hero like the great Sephiroth, huh?” Typical.

“Oh, not really. Though I think he’s neat.” _Neat_? “To be honest I’m more interested in Midgar. That’s where Shinra’s headquarters are, right? It’s like a real city, right? Is it amazing? Do you love it?”

“I mean, it’s all right, I guess,” Reno mutters awkwardly, scratching at the back of his ear. Depends on where you’re living.

“Man, lucky. My dream is to go make my fortune in Midgar some day. I’ve been saving up my allowance for years, decided that the first thing I’d do upon arriving is to go see an official production of _Loveless_.” He sighs wistfully and plays with the straw of his milkshake. “Today is the last performance of the original cast, though.”

Reno catches Rude’s glance in his periphery, but his face must give everything away because Rude immediately blurts out, “Reno, no.”

“Ah, c’mon. If we leave now we can catch the matinee and have him back before it gets too dark. You know you’ve been wanting to see it for a while, too.”

Rude coughs into his fist. “Even still, why would _you_ go out of your way to do something like _that_ for _him_?” To his credit, the kid seems incredibly unruffled at the dig.

“Whaddaya mean, I’m selfless as fuck.”

Rude raises an eyebrow at him.

“Don’t you raise that eyebrow at me, _Rudolph Muriel Callahan II_.”

Rude gapes. Then quickly pins his gaze on the kid, who wisely averts his eyes and slurps down the rest of his milkshake. He groans and settles one hand over his forehead. “…What do you want to never tell another living soul about this?”

“Just light—I mean—lead the way!”

+++

_Loveless_ is a piece of shit. But of course it is. Rich people have a lot of goddamn money but no goddamn sense or taste. Look no further than exhibit Rufus Shinra, heir to the throne, who dresses like some goth rock band vampire weirdo.

At least Rude paid for the tickets.

And the kid liked it, judging by the way he’s chattering at Rude, who’s looking increasingly haggard as the hours wear on. An added bonus. He’ll never say shit about a wrinkle again.

As they turn the corner down Loveless Alley back toward HQ, two things happen simultaneously: Reno reaches for his cigarettes and something barrels straight into his back. He faceplants into the pavement with a hiss as he reaches backward for his EMR, but Rude is faster, sprints down the alleyway to take the culprit by the wrist.

It’s a slum kid dressed in an oversized hoodie, thrashing wildly against Rude’s hold. They get one booted foot onto his chest and kick with enough force to loosen Rude’s grasp, which sends them tumbling backwards to the ground. The hood whips off to reveal knotty red hair and a look of utter, unbridled contempt as _she_ scrambles wildly for the prize nicked from Reno’s jacket pocket. Only…

“A box of sweets? You’re dressed like _that_ and all you have in your pocket is a box of fucking sweets?” she hisses, tossing the box onto the ground and sending tiny wrapped candies flying everywhere.

“Hey!”

Rude has her by the arm again in an instant and she lets out a stream of curses that has even Reno raising his eyebrows.

“Beggars can’t be choosers. But also, only idiots keep their money in their pockets. So choose your mark better next time.”

“You _just_ said beggars can’t be choosers you bad dye-job redheaded fuck.”

Reno smirks and saunters up to her with a raised hand and she instantly cowers into her hoodie. All bluff and no gruff. Figures. He flicks her on the forehead. “Consider it a blessing we’re choosing to let you live.”

She spits on his shoe before puffing her cheeks so hard her whole face turns red. Reno’s sense of déjà vu hits a split-second too late. Before he can cover her mouth with his hand she starts screaming like a goddamn banshee. “Help! Help please! These two men are taking me! Oh, god, please don’t let them take me! HELP!”

Rude’s eyes widen and his grasp slackens just enough to allow the girl to sprint off, still howling for help. There’s crowds of people milling around the theater and it’s only a matter of time before one of them decides to be a good-hearted samaritan and pretend to care enough about some slum brat to make it onto the news. So Reno dashes after her and does the only thing he can think to do.

He karate chops her on the back of her neck and she crumples to the floor.

Rude looks genuinely impressed. “Didn’t think that would actually work in real life.”

“I _know_ , right?” He decides to light a victory cigarette.

“D-did you just kill that girl?” Ah shit, forgot all about the kid. Said kid is backing away slowly, hands raised and voice trembling. “W-w-w-wait, are you the bad guys? Did I just see _Loveless_ with _the bad guys_? Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shitshit _shit_ PLEASE DON’T KILL ME, I—”

His eyes roll to the back of his head as he crumples to the ground. Rude stands above him, glancing at the straight line of his palm appraisingly.

“Hey, is that a smile?”

“Nope.” It’s definitely a smile. “So, what now?”

“Well—” Reno’s about to come up with the perfect plan to get them out of this mess like he always does, except his phone decides to ring at that very moment. And all he hears are two clipped words before the line goes dead. “HQ. Now.”

+++

Tseng is waiting for them with crossed arms at the HQ entrance. He glances from one kid to another, each one dangling from Rude’s shoulders, and then sighs and lets out a string of Wutai curses. Which means he’s pretty mad. He forces Reno into one of the waiting rooms they usually used to, ahem, extract information, and orders Rude to follow him down the hallway with the kids in tow.

Hours later finds Reno lying on the floor; tired, hungry, and the tiniest bit concerned. But mostly bored. He’s burned through his entire pack of cigarettes and the three sweets he managed to salvage off the ground, and he doesn’t know how many more games of pixelated Snake he can stand to play on his phone. Which won’t matter soon because his phone is almost dead and maybe, finally, so is he.

Ah, fuck.

He tosses the phone to the side and closes his eyes. The skin under them prickles, hot and pulsing like the tip of a needle. Like the edge of a knife. Like he wants to fucking cry.

He doesn’t know what time it is when Tseng finally reappears at the door, holding a cup of what can only be shitty vending machine coffee and a greasy paper bag. He tosses the bag at Reno’s prone chest and seats himself onto the only chair in the room as Reno sits up from the floor and nearly rips open the bag in his haste. He crams the strawberry frosted donut down his throat and chases it with the coffee Tseng offers. He’s licking frosting off his fingers by the time he realizes that Tseng only ever buys him donuts when he’s done a good job. So, maybe Reno’s not on the chopping block just yet.

Or this was his last meal.

Tseng’s face is unreadable and silent.

“So, uh, what’s up, boss?”

Tseng sighs and temples his fingers in front of him. “What’s _up_ is that on the one day I decide you’re ready for more responsibility and hand you the keys to the helicopter, I receive notice that not only have you returned, early, from your Mideel trip, sans a SOLDIER candidate, but you decided to take said keys out of HQ to go play hooky at the theater. Furthermore, when I call you back to HQ to discuss this indiscretion, you return with two passed-out strays because for some reason you can’t help karate chopping children.”

“Rude did it too,” Reno mutters. Unhelpfully. Tseng’s jaw clicks. Welp, he’s done. It was a good run. Maybe the donut was already poisoned to save them all some effort.

But still.

He can’t help but feel a little bad about it. “So, what’d you do with ’em?”

“Well, the boy woke up, fainted, woke up again, fainted again, and then when he could finally stay awake for more than two minutes told me a very interesting story.” The corners of Tseng’s lips curl. “Rudolph Muriel Callahan. The second.”

Reno’s guffawing before he can help it. “It’s really fucking funny, right?”

Even Tseng can’t resist chuckling aloud at that. “Yes, it’s really fucking funny. But what’s funnier is that somehow we’ve ended up with a SOLDIER candidate from Mideel after all.”

Reno’s laughter dies in his throat. “The kid?”

“He’s in quite good shape from running around herding animals on his family farm, and he’s got a keen eye for detail and a great memory.” He flings a folder at Reno, who catches it with still sticky fingers. The first page has a picture of the kid sans floppy hat. He’s just about as generic looking as Reno figured: brown hair, brown eyes, a splash of freckles over his nose and cheeks. Eighteen years old.

“Kunsel Freeman, huh?” Somehow making his fortune in Midgar after all.

“We ran some tests, made him an offer, and he accepted on the spot. He’s spending the night in a spare room at Shinra’s mandatory housing, but he’ll need a ride back home to pack his belongings. I trust you still have those keys?”

“Yessir—hey, wait, when did you even get this file printed?”

“About an hour after you got here.”

“I’ve been cooped up here for life seven!”

Tseng glances at his wristwatch. “Five. And consider it punishment for taking Shinra property out of HQ.”

Better than a beating. But there’s still one last tiny, annoying banshee.

“And the girl?”

“Why Reno, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you actually cared about these kids.”

“ _Hell_ no.” A beat. “But, she’s all right, right?” He frowns as Tseng hands him another folder.

“She’s getting sent to Wutai.”

“ _What_?”

“Relax. We’ve got a base on one of the smaller islands. She’ll be able to get some good training there.”

“Training?” Reno blinks and opens the second folder.

“Weren’t you the one who said we were, ah, hurting for help?” Tseng shrugs. “Well, you were right. She’s just what we needed for our upcoming mission.”

The file has a picture of the girl, cleaned up so that her hair is more wavy than knotted, and her gaze is less severe, but not much more than that. There are thick black lines where her vitals should be. “What’s her name?”

“Classified.”

Reno raises an eyebrow.

“Rather, off the record. Redacted. She won’t have one anymore because she won’t _need_ one anymore. What we needed was someone who could disappear.” His teeth catch between his lips slightly. “I’ve only ever met one other person in my life who was so desperate to disappear.”

“Oh.” Maybe someone cares about slum kids, after all.

“It’s not in the file, but I thought you might like to know. She’s fourteen right now. You know what that means?”

It means she’s the same age as General Sephiroth when he single-handedly turned the tide of the Wutai war.

It means she’s the same age as the brat.

“It means you aren’t the youngest Turk recruit anymore.”

“For fucks sake, Tseng, can’t I have anything?”

Tseng chuckles and slaps him lightly on the shoulder on his way out the door, and Reno has to fight every muscle to keep the stupid grin from growing on his stupid face.

It also means that maybe he doesn’t need to keep justifying his place here. He’s a Turk. Period.

And it’s the first real fight he’s lost in years.

+++

“Your hair’s getting long. You should do something with it. Like tie it. Or…braid it!”

“I’d sooner shave my head.”

“Liar. You care so much about your appearance.” Her fingers tug insistently on his scalp and he hisses. “See, your roots are showing.”

“What’s with the fucking scrutiny? Are you starting a file on me? Trying to become a Turk?”

She hums in consideration. “You think I could make it?”

“Fuck no.” He scowls as she smooths his hair into a tiny ponytail, ties it off with one of her incredibly sturdy flower stems.

It’s her birthday today and they’re high in the rafters of the church again. Well, he was up here to take a nap when she decided to climb up and annoy him the shit out of him. And when he stopped replying to her she started playing with his hair. And instead of fighting it, he decided he was too tired to give a fuck. That’s it.

She pokes and weaves a few more flowers into his ponytail before finally making a noise of satisfaction and removing her hands from his head. She scoots away from him to dangle her legs over the edge of the rafters, swings them back and forth. “Thomas tried to kiss me.”

Who the fuck is Thomas? “Want me to mess him up?”

She laughs and shakes her head slowly, stretching her legs straight out in front of her. “No, I already clobbered his snot nose.”

Reno snickers and closes his eyes. Tries to fall asleep but somehow keeps coming back to the question of _who the fuck is Thomas_? Realizes he’s not going to be able to sleep after all and sighs. Lights himself a consolation cigarette. Inhales and exhales slowly, intentionally, releasing a ring of smoke that sputters higher and higher into the air before it winks out of existence.

“I didn’t know you could do that.”

“You don’t know a lot of shit.”

She huffs as he snickers again. “I wanna try!” And then she’s making grabby hands for it. He jukes four of her painfully obvious swipes without skipping a beat, before realizing he’s just wasting a good cigarette, slows his pace so that she can grab his left hand with both of hers. She lets out an elated cry of triumph as she pries the cigarette from his fingers. She stares determinedly at the filter before closing her eyes and cramming it between her lips. And then doesn’t move, doesn’t even seem to breathe, opens her glassy green eyes to stare helplessly at him.

“Inhale.”

Her nose wiggles as she sniffs.

“Through your _mouth_!”

Her eyes brighten as she takes a breath deep into her lungs. And promptly coughs them out. She beats at her chest frantically and the movement nearly sends her clean off the rafter if he didn’t grab her hand at the very last second. His cigarette isn’t as lucky, falls straight into the flowerbed to wink out of existence.

“Shit.”

“Hey, watch yer language!” Oh god, he’s starting to sound like Tseng. He pulls her up with some effort and she scrambles back onto the rafters, scoots closer toward him. Doesn’t let go of the arm of his suit jacket.

“Th-thanks.”

It’s her birthday today and here she is, smoking up in the church rafters with the bad guy and nearly plummeting to her death. What a fucking birthday.

Wait.

Shit.

Fuck.

He finally remembers who the fuck Thomas is.

Thomas is the snot-nosed Brat Pack Leader he once paid off. He groans and she glances over with some alarm, tugs at his arm insistently.

“What’s wrong? Did you get hurt somewhere?”

“ _No_.” Fuck. Why did he have to go and remember something as stupid as that? “Ah, fuck.” He’s on year six of a never-ending, impossible mission. Shit, what had Rude once said about the best way to gain trust? “Do you…remember your tenth birthday party?”

Green eyes balloon wide. “Reno, you don’t—”

“Thomas. I paid him not to come to your party. I paid him to make sure no one would.”

She doesn’t say anything for a very long moment, stares at him before leaning her head back against the wall of the church, says, voice so soft he almost misses it, “I know.”

“I’m— _what_?”

“I didn’t know then, necessarily. But I had a hunch.” She sighs and stretches her legs out in front of her. “What did you pay him?”

“My lighter.” She’s taking this far too well.

Her eyes round at that. “Oh! _Oh_. That’s where it went.”

That’s what surprises her most? “Maybe I’m being stupid, but shouldn’t you be, I don’t know. Angry or something? Anything???”

“Sorry to say, but you lost your lighter for nothing.” She smiles faintly, and it’s that smile that belies her age. “They weren’t gonna come anyway.”

“What do you mean? You brats spent everyday together. _Every day_. Do you know how many days I heard about your party? Every fucking day. You were talking about your party for weeks. You were all excited and shit.”

She sighs again. “They weren’t going to come because of Jamie—” Who the fuck is— “Jamie was the boy who went missing in Sector 5 all those year ago.”

Ah. The pile of rags.

Even now it makes the bile run back up his throat.

“When he first went missing, I wouldn’t stop asking about him. I couldn’t. I knew—I _knew_ something was wrong and I didn’t understand why no one was worried. Why no one cared. They said Jamie was always running off on his own. That he’d be back. It was just life in the slums. And it’s true. It was true. But I felt it. I felt _him_. Scared. Alone. In the dark. Anguish. Limbo. Caught between life and death. Agony.

“And then, one day, it stopped. And I felt such a flood of relief until I realized what it meant. You know, Jamie was the first one who invited me to play, who invited me into the group. My first friend. And I stopped asking about him the day before his body was returned to his mother.

“I think…I think they knew I knew. Somehow. After a while. Children can be really perceptive. The look in their eyes when they heard the news, when they looked at me. Fear. Resentment. Anger. Hate. I think they blamed me somehow and I—I probably deserved it. He…Jamie never returned to the planet. If only I had—if only I could—”

“What the fuck are you talking about, Princess?”

“H-huh?”

“What could you have possibly done?”

“I—”

“I was barely able to keep _you_ from…” Reno shakes his head. “You’re just a fucking kid, geezus. How the hell could that be your fault?”

She sniffs once. Twice. Bows her head but he’s already seen watery green marbles, overflowing and uncontrollable. They fall too fast for her to wipe frantically away so she gives up and gives in and bawls her goddamn heart out. Clings to his jacket and weeps and wheezes and gets snot all over it. He looks away to give her some space, lights another cigarette and smokes with his right hand. He goes through two cigarettes, and is putting out the butt of the second on the rafter when she descends into slow hiccups that finally cease.

“You okay?”

Her eyes are splotchy red, and so are her cheeks, and her lower lip is still trembling, but she nods.

“It’s all right if ya ain’t.”

She nods again, but this time offers a brave if watery smile. “Cake.”

“Wha?”

She crawls toward the knapsack she carried up with her, and removes two plastic containers and two plastic forks, sets them on the floor and pushes one pair toward him. She doesn’t say another word, just pops off her lid, and hums _Happy Birthday_ to herself.

He shakes his head slowly. If she doesn’t want to talk any further, that’s fine too. He takes up the container, pops off the lid, and frowns. “It’s strawberry shortcake.”

“Hm?”

“You and yer ma always make a spiced chocolate cake for your birthdays.” He narrows his eyes at her. “Isn’t chocolate your favorite?”

She smiles and pops a strawberry in her mouth.

The cake is delicious.

But way too fucking sweet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rude as Zangan’s pupil is 100% stolen from smarter fans than me, but if my only contribution to this fandom is Rude as a nickname for Rudolph, I will die happy. 
> 
> So, the more I think and write and research the Turks for this story, the more confused I get, which has bled into some of my replies to y’all. They’re a highly elite organization that everyone knows about (but also no one should know about?), and Vincent was one before the start of OG, but aside from Veld and the Legendary Turk, all the others introduced in Before Crisis are new recruits. So are the current four the only experienced ones or are there more SE just never bothered to introduce? And if there are more, why is Tseng already second-in-command during BC (but also hanging around Zack all the time in CC) and more importantly why is Reno _third_??? 
> 
> Which is basically the reason this story morphed into a Reno origin story of how he ranked up to second-in-command by the time of OG/Remake, because Rude took on Cloud _and_ Aerith and didn’t even wrinkle his suit jacket. So I guess what I’m saying is Rude deserves a promotion, yo.
> 
> Sorry for the lack of Aerith in this chapter (the Mideel chunk of this was supposed to be part of the previous chapter to explain Rude’s seemingly random medical skills ~~and if this was a Rude fic it would have gotten into how his parents got divorced when he was young and he and his sick mother moved to Junon where he trained with Zangan and all people think this much when writing fic right?~~ , and then my brain went “haha YOU THOUGHT”). But! She’s definitely back in focus for the last two chapters (I mean, this fic has to earn that Aerith/Reno tag eventually right?) as well as The Guy everyone’s been guessing would make an appearance since I promised new faces in chapter 2. The next chapter in particular is probably gonna hurt a bit, so apologies in advance if takes another few months for that update. <3 
> 
> Fun facts! According to the FF Fandom Wiki, Cissnei is canonically the youngest member to join the Turks, which is a fact that bothered the hell out of me (despite knowing I’ve already skirted canon multiple times in writing this) until it became something I could shoehorn into the story to juxtapose the age of Wutai war hero Sephiroth (except I’m doing the math now and apparently he was TWELVE, wtf Shinra) and Aerith herself. And yes, Cissnei was absolutely sent to Wutai for training because Shuriken.
> 
> Kunsel’s family name is taken from his VA, Crispin Freeman, who also voices Rude in previous Compilation installments (which made writing their Mideel connection extra fun). Also, Kunsel should have been a Turk. Just sayin.


	5. Life goes on

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“I said stop following me.” Geezus fuck._
> 
> _“There’s only one door to the church, Princess—and seems like you were waiting for me.” He walks off without further comment and she hurries after him._
> 
> _“You never use the door,” she accuses, voice dripping with suspicion, and he throws his hands into the air._
> 
> _“You know you’re following me now, right?”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For dreamfighter, the crack to my ship.

What a fucking year.

And it’s only been a few months.

Because it’s not enough that last year ended with Genesis fucking off with all the Second and Third Class SOLDIERS and making the Turks work overtime to clean up his goddamn mess. Oh no, then Veld suddenly decided it was time to recruit eleven Turk noobs. And who the fuck could have guessed who would have to train every last one of ’em?

And then Avalanche tried to fucking blow up Midgar with Junon’s cannon.

And Shinra’s answer to _that_ was to make the Turks work additional overtime to recruit more goddamn SOLDIER candidates.

And then, the strawberry on top of this shitstorm of an entire century packed into a few months of a single year: the Shinra building is infiltrated and they have to spend all night fighting a bunch of _killer fucking robots_. You can’t make this shit up. And after an all nighter of _that_ , after Reno is bruised and battered and just wants to get some sleep, Tseng calls him to check up on the brat. 

And with all these Turk noobs running around you’d think someone with less seniority would be able to handle this babysitting gig but, _no no no_ , Tseng has the gall to add that Reno is the only one he can trust to keep her safe. 

And the worst part of it all is that words of affirmation from Tseng always fuck him over with pride and shit. And Tseng fucking knows it.

So Reno goes to check up on the brat.

And ends up chaperoning a goddamn date.

+++

He chaperones a lot of dates.

Because suddenly Reno has far too much free time on his hands now that Avalanche is laying low, what with all the Turk noobs desperate to prove themselves, eager to please, chomping at the bit for every new assignment. But instead of getting to enjoy some time off, Tseng reminds him about his mission. 

Said mission has a new boytoy in Zack Fair, newly promoted SOLDIER First Class.

And the pair of them? Disgusting. Godawful. Absolute cringe. Their first date lasted like five hours and ended with Zack buying her a ribbon before they went to a park to be all woobie and vulnerable and talk about their _feelings_. Barf. Since then, he’s trailed them all over Sector 5 for dates two through like _two-hundred_ because Zack spends any and every free moment he has down in the fucking slums, even if it’s just to “see her face.” Ugh. Sometimes he accompanies her to the market, follows her up and down all the aisles like a damn puppy, carries all her groceries home and is always invited in for dinner. Other times they go to the park to hold hands and make moon eyes at each other and take turns pushing each other on the single swing that’s still attached to the set. 

But most times they end up at the church, because that’s where she always goes, and wherever she goes, Zack follows. And since Zack’s Mako senses are always tingling and he’s nearly caught Reno trailing them too many times to count, Reno can’t even settle in his old spot in the rafters. So every time they go to the church, which is every time, he has to huff and puff and climb all the way up to the roof to keep an eye on them through the giant hole in it.

Reno sometimes can’t decide if he gets paid too much for this shit or not remotely enough.

Today they’re having a picnic in the church, and there is a familiar fluffy pink blanket spread out beneath them. The blanket is child-sized and tiny, so they sit close together, arms and hands constantly bumping into each other, saying _sorry, sorry_ every time their skin touches and their eyes meet and they shyly glance away before going right back to ogling each other. And it’s all for nothing because their thighs are pressed so firmly together she might as well be sitting in his lap. 

Zack has a SOLDIER’s appetite so it never takes them long to finish the sandwiches and thermoses of mouthwatering soup, pasta salad and containers full of delicately fried beef and vegetable patties. They make plans to build a wagon so they can sell flowers on the upper plate, beneath the endless, terrifying expanse of the sky. She asks if it’s safe, and it’s not the first time, but every time she does her voice is so—tiny? fragile? soft?—off putting. Unfamiliar. For some reason it makes Reno’s scalp prickle. But Zack always laughs it off and says that the sky is really beautiful, just like her— _barf_ —just like his eyes— _double barf_ —and that he’ll be there to protect her from anything. Disgusting. 

Dessert is strawberries with whipped cream and when she gets some on the corner of her mouth, Zack laughs and wipes it clean with his thumb—and they both freeze, wide-eyed, mouths parted, and oh no. Very slowly, Zack’s hand slides over her shoulder and she closes his eyes as he ducks his head low and— 

Yup. Not paid remotely enough. He should ask Tseng for a raise. Maybe a promotion. 

There’s a rustle of fabric followed by a breathy little gasp and Reno rolls his eyes toward the plate and lights a cigarette that does little to quell his mounting irritation. He smokes it clean through while idly wondering what Tseng would do to Zack if Reno reported this—because surely this counts as laying a hand on the Ancient—but before he can dwell too much longer on it, the phone rings. The cigarette falls from his hands as he scrambles to silence his phone lest he blow his cover, but the noise stops before he reaches it.

It’s not his phone. 

“Yup, mmhm, you sure? I—” There’s a long pause during which Reno can’t help but peer down at them. Her ribbon is undone and lies scattered across the flowerbed, hair a wild tangle of messy auburn curls. The straps of her dress hang loosely around her shoulders, exposing just the barest hint of paler skin beneath. Zack sighs and shuts his phone, looking completely exasperated. 

“You have to go?” She looks at him with large, round, doe-eyes. 

“Yeah, I’m—I’m so sorry.” She wordlessly adjusts the straps of her dress and he sighs. “You have _no_ idea how sorry. But I’ll make it up to you. Promise.” 

“It’s fine.” Though her voice sounds anything but. “Duty calls, right?” She reaches over to retrieve her ribbon and—stills. 

Zack’s face falls. “Maybe I could just say I’m feeling sick…”

“No, no, you should go. Thank you—it means enough you would stay.” 

He kisses her on the forehead, her cheek, her mouth, before pulling back with far too white of a grin. “See ya.”

“See ya.” 

His clunking footsteps echo through the entire church, reverberate the walls and even jostle the tiles under Reno’s ass from the sheer force of him. When he’s gone and the church is quiet, her face turns from sweetly serene to pinched sour. She reaches deep into the flowerbed, rustles around until she finds a still smoldering cigarette butt.

Ah, shit.

“Reno!” He could probably slip away pretty easily, seriously contemplates it, but then she follows up with an outraged, “Have you been there the whole time?” And like, what the fuck does she expect?

She’s never seemed to mind him lurking around before.

In fact, when’s the last time she didn’t immediately notice and barge in on _his_ space? 

And finally, why the fuck does he need to run away, _anyway_? He’s just doing his goddamn job.

So he slips through the roof, swings to land neatly onto the rafters, dangles his legs off it and lights another cigarette. “Sup, Princess.”

“Don’t _sup, Princess_ me, how long have you been following us around?” she demands, voice surly and hands balled into fists at her waist. And her voice isn’t _tiny fragile soft_ anymore. It’s grating and bratty and really fucking annoying.

“Classified.” 

“Well, stop it!” 

“Can’t.”

“Why not?”

“You think I’d be here if I had a choice?” 

Her eyes flash and she inhales sharply and for a second Reno thinks she’s going to scream like she always does. Instead she hisses, “You’re in luck then, because I am never, ever, _ever_ going willingly to Shinra. So do us both a favor and _stop_ following me.” She sniffs and averts her gaze, tosses the empty containers into her picnic basket, balls up the blanket and stuffs it under her arm before stalking out of the church. So fucking dramatic. He rolls his eyes and finishes his cigarette and when he’s done, flicks the butt off the ledge before jumping off the rafters to land neatly beside it. The butt is still smoking near the edge of the flowers, and Reno briefly imagines the whole thing going up in flames.

He stomps it out and crushes a few flowers beneath his foot. She wants to sell them on the upper plate, huh?

Whatever.

He shambles out the door and nearly has a heart attack when she ambushes him. “I _said_ stop following me.” Geezus fuck.

“There’s only one door to the church, Princess—and seems like _you_ were waiting for me.” He walks off without further comment and she hurries after him.

“You never use the door,” she accuses, voice dripping with suspicion, and he throws his hands into the air.

“You know you’re following me now, right?” 

She yanks him to a stop behind a building and hisses. “What did you hear?”

“Wha?”

“What did you _report_?”

Reno blinks. And then guffaws. “What, you really think Tseng cares that you wanna go topside to sell your stupid flowers?” 

“They’re _not_ stu—”

“Or that you put on an act around SOLDIER boy?” 

“I don’t put on an act!” 

“You sure as hell don’t raise your voice like this when he’s around.” 

“He never gives me a reason to!” Her eyes harden. “He’s nice. And sweet. And thoughtful! And—and so what if he makes me want to be a better person?” Her lower lip trembles and he doesn’t miss the way her hands curl around that pink ribbon.

“What’s wrong with the person ya were?” She lowers her gaze and doesn’t reply, but he reads her loud and clear. It’s cause she’s a kid from the slums and living under a steel sky isn’t really living, and it cuts you up and fucks you up in all sorts of ways and makes you feel bad about yourself because you’re not special and no one gives a fuck if you’re dead or alive. Except she’s always been the exception to that. She’s a goddamn Alien Princess and there’s a whole division of black suits in the business of ensuring she stays alive. And for what? So that she can place her pitiful self esteem on some _nice guy_? He sneers. “Oh I get it. It’s the old puppy act and you fell for it hook, line and sinker.” Her mouth pinches but he carries cruelly on. “I mean, do you really think he’s gonna stay all _nice and sweet and thoughtful_ without wanting something in return? Shit, it’s been how many weeks and he’s already getting into your dress?” 

“Stop it.”

He should, he knows he should, but he’s too fucking pissed and he doesn’t even know why. “Well good, go ahead and fuck him. Pop out some freaky baby alien SOLDIER monsters. Bet Hojo would _love_ that—”

“I SAID STOP IT!” She wails and aims a kick at his shins, but he catches her easily by the ankle. She’s traded canary yellow for delicate white sundresses and sturdy boots for flimsy, heeled sandals.

“We’re not kids anymore, Princess,” he says lowly, fingers tightening over her skin. She winces and he drops her leg, watches her falter, stumble to the ground. 

“Then why don’t _you_ stop acting like a child, Reno.” Her eyes flash glassy green and the childish thing to do would be to stay and argue with this brat. The mature thing to do would be his damn job to make sure she gets home safe. But what Reno wants to do lands somewhere in the middle. 

“Yeah, nope.” He leaves and doesn’t look back.

So, weeks later, when Tseng asks for an update, Reno comes up empty.

“Reno—” 

“I’m not paid enough to babysit for two. Sides, SOLDIER boytoy can take care of her, right?” For some reason, the words leave a bitter aftertaste.

“That’s not the mission.”

“Look, if you’re so worried why don’t _you_ watch ’em? I’ve got Avalanche scum to fry.” He knows Tseng can’t argue with that.

+++

The problem isn’t that maybe Reno is acting like a petulant teenager or that the brat _is_ one. The problem is that Tseng is far too soft on her. And too soft on Reno. So the second in command of the fucking Turks starts babysitting the Ancient and her boytoy.

The problem isn’t even that Zack’s a piece of shit, either. Reno knows how to deal with that. Reno _is_ that.

The problem is: when Reno asked Kunsel for some intel on Zack all those weeks ago, Kunsel had nothing but glowing words of admiration and praise. He runs the kid’s damn fanclub. Even Rude cracked a smile when Zack told him a knock knock joke. 

Hell, Cissnei likes him, and she doesn’t even like herself. 

“Hey, Reno! Wanna grab lunch in the cafeteria?”

The problem is: it is so fucking hard to hate Zack Fair’s puppy ass.

“Sure, but yer paying.”

Zack’s smile is far too white. “Okay!”

+++

Life goes on until it doesn’t. 

Of the two remaining First Class SOLDIERS, the great war hero Sephiroth goes insane and razes Nibelheim to the ground. 

And Zack Fair is officially declared MIA.

+++

The day after they return from covering up what is now only referred to as The Nibelheim Incident, Tseng locks himself in his office, but not before ordering Reno to patrol Sector 5.

It’s not up for debate.

So Reno adds Sector 5 to his patrol routes, lingers just long enough to make sure she’s still alive. She’s taken to dressing in pink from head to toe, so it’s hard to miss her. 

He keeps his distance, though, doesn’t say a word, because after two years and shit, what can he even say? _Sorry about your boyfriend?_

Fuck. 

He sees the tip of her twisty braid disappear through the church doors and, against his better judgement, decides to follow. Enters through the back way and almost loses his footing on the old stairwell that finally rotted all the way through, just manages to climb up into the rafters anyway.

Today she has a picnic basket filled with way too much food for one. Lays her tiny pink blanket on the floor and smooths out her skirt to seat herself delicately on top of it, opens up all her containers and doesn’t eat a bite. Sits in silence with her hands folded over her lap until they’re clutching desperately at her face and she’s gasping and snuffling for air.

When she’s finished, she lies back on the blanket, the top of her head cradled by flowers. He lights a cigarette and inhales so deeply that he almost doesn’t hear her plaintive, whispered, “Just tell me he’s alive.”

Would he, if he could? 

“ _Please_.” 

He shakes his head slowly. “You know the answer to that, Princess.”

“What about the last time you saw him?”

“It’s classified.”

“He was in Nibelheim the last time he picked up…”

Fuck, he went and told her that? “Classified.”

“With Sephiroth.”

“Classified.”

“I can feel him!” she blurts out, thick with emotion. “He’s scared. And hurt. He’s in _agony_ it won’t end they won’t let it end what are they doing to him?!” 

“…It’s—” Fucking awful and he knows it and she knows it but that doesn’t change anything.

“Just tell me something!” she shrieks, shrill and broken and fargone and what the fuck does she expect?

“Ask me something I can answer!” 

She chokes on a sob, rolls over to bury her face in the flowers and Reno lets the cigarette burn his fingers before he scrapes it against the wood.

Silence except the sound of tiny helpless hiccups. And then, “…How old are you, Reno?”

He blinks. To be honest, he’s lost track of the time and Turks don’t really celebrate birthdays. Hell, he’s pretty sure Tseng’s been thirty for the last five years. But he knows her file like the back of his hand, and for her, for today, he can answer. He can count. “Almost six.”

“Fine, don’t tell me anything,” she says viciously, slams her fists onto the floor and kicks her basket aside and throws a goddamn tantrum until she finally storms out of the church altogether.

Reno stays long after she leaves, smokes another two cigarettes before he finally swings off the rafters to survey the damage. A large corner of the flower patch has been ripped to shreds, stems and petals and roots upturned and all, and the contents of the basket are _everywhere_. He toes one of the containers and the scent of tart lemon spills out with a crumbled slice of yellow cake. And, sitting on top of a pew is a single envelope addressed to Zack Fair. 

“Happy fucking birthday, Princess.” 

He slips the letter into his pocket, passes it onto Tseng when he returns. 

It’s the first of many to come. 

+++

She doesn’t leave her house for a whole year after that, not that it matters. 

It seems that Professor Hojo has outgrown his interest in Ancient blood. He’s still in Nibelheim.

Reno’s cigarette butts linger on the roof, but her window never opens.

+++

The next year he leaves a bottle of corel wine on her window sill, a gift from the company holiday grab bag. He can’t stand the stuff himself; it’s far too sweet.

The next morning, he catches Elmyra sweeping glass off the backyard.

+++

Life goes on because that’s the only thing it’s good for. 

Except now he’s not the only one keeping an eye on her from the rafters. If she notices either of them she doesn’t show it.

She hasn’t said a word to him since her eighteenth birthday. Not that he’s counting. Not that he cares. Feels like only weeks ago that all he ever wanted was for her to shut the hell up for a change. 

And then, at the end of the year, the Turks are informed that two research specimens have escaped from Nibelheim.

Life goes on and on and on— 

+++

But they’re too late. 

When the radio crackles with orders for the entire Shinra army to be deployed to the outskirts of Midgar, they’re already hovering over Kalm, and by the time they turn the helicopter around, they’re still too late.

Zack Fair lies dead on a cliff. 

Rude kneels by his body and, with two fingers, gently closes Mako-tinged eyes. Zack’s clothes are torn up with holes, but the skin beneath is intact, bloated and tinged silver from bullets. The last vestiges of Mako regeneration at work long after the heart stops. Reno resists the urge to vomit, because he’s older now. But just barely.

“What do we do?” 

Rude adjusts his sunglasses. “Hojo will want the body.”

“ _Fuck Hojo_.”

Rude doesn’t reply, but he knows they’re in agreement. They always are. 

When they give their report in Tseng’s office hours later, and Hojo asks for the body, Reno shrugs. “All we found was a scrap of paper.” 

Rude offers him said scrap of paper. It’s splattered with blood and barely legible, and the bottom of it has been torn clean off. 

“That’s all you found?” Hojo repeats, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, peering through them with narrowed eyes.

Reno keeps his hands jammed into the pockets of his jacket and doesn’t meet his creepy stare. “Yup.”

“You found a single scrap of paper fluttering about the cliffs surrounding Midgar, when the winds were predicted to be anything but predictable.” 

“Like a needle in a haystack, right?” He smiles with just his teeth. “Guess we were lucky.”

Hojo crosses over to them and snatches at Reno’s elbow. His skin crawls, but his hand is empty, leather gloves pristinely clean. He even offers Hojo his other empty, gloved hand.

“If you’re done interrogating my men, Professor,” Tseng cuts in with a polite, razor edge to his voice, “we need to debrief.” 

Hojo releases Reno’s arm and turns away with a sneer, mutters, “whole department gone to shit” and “traitorous head.” 

The door slams shut behind him and it’s Rude who breaks the silence. “Fucking creep.” 

They’re all in agreement.

But now the room is spinning above his head and Reno’s hands are shaking and he can’t breathe and he needs some air. So he makes for the door even as Tseng calls out to him. “Reno, debrief.”

“Gimme five minutes.” 

“ _Reno_.”

But Reno ignores him and runs to the only single-stall bathroom on the whole floor, locks the door and vomits bile into the sink. He wipes his mouth with the back of his glove and grimaces, shucks them off and scrubs his hands raw under blistering cold water. When he shuts off the faucet, there’s still dirt caked beneath his fingernails. 

He slams his fists into the wall because _fuck_.

Zack was one of the good ones.

+++

By the time Reno makes it back to the office, it’s pitch black outside and Rude is long gone. Only Tseng remains, diligently typing at his computer. There are three large piles of paperwork on his desk and when he closes the folder in his hands and sets it onto the large pile to his left, he straightens the entire stack and walks across the room to place it neatly into a file cabinet. He doesn’t look at him once as he walks back to his desk to start on the second pile. Reno hovers along the edges of the room until he notices one last thing on Tseng’s otherwise orderly desk. 

It’s a box of letters. Reno rests his fists against it. “Why didn’t you order Cissnei to bring them to you all those months ago?” 

Tseng keeps his eyes on his screen. “The whole Shinra army wasn’t after them all those months ago.”

“It was the Ancient’s fucking boyfriend—it was _Zack_ —don’t you think he deserved more than getting gunned down on a fucking cliff?”

“Why do you think I sent two of my best—” 

“Don’t you dare turn this on me—” 

“Reno, calm down. Now, more than ever, I need you to focus on the mission—”

“The mission? The _mission_?! You think she’s gonna come willingly to Shinra after she finds out—”

“She won’t find out.” Tseng says, and his tone is clear. A direct order from the Head of the Turks is indisputable. 

Reno swipes the box off Tseng’s desk but takes no satisfaction in the way it smashes to the floor, sending neatly addressed letters scattering everywhere. Tseng closes the folder in his hand and starts a new pile to his left. “Don’t forget to sign the paperwork for your promotion. It’s months overdue.”

“Fuck you, Tseng.”

Everything is worse because Tseng’s eyes are red, too.

+++

Zack. 

Sephiroth. 

The Nibelheim Incident.

It’s classified.

Classified. 

_Classified._

It’s classified, and yet—

+++

It takes him a full week before he can drag himself back to the abandoned church in Sector 5. He spies her through the gap in the doors, on her hands and knees in the middle of the church. She’s wearing pink again, and the front of her dress is stained brown and green with earth as she carefully digs holes into the dirt and fills it with seeds, before burying it over. Dig, fill, bury, repeat. Half of the flower patch is gone. 

The door groans when he forces it open and she startles at the sight of him.

“Reno…?” She doesn’t even look confused or angry, just very, very sad, and older than she should. 

What the fuck can he say? “Zack—”

“Don’t.” Her voice trembles as she quickly rises to her feet, hands clasped in front of her. 

“But—”

“ _Please._ ” she begs, warns, shaking her head. “Don’t say anything. Just—just stay here. For a little while. Please.”

So he stays. Sits on the dusty pew closest to the front and smokes a cigarette, and then another, as she continues to plant her seeds. She’s going to get dirt beneath her fingernails at this rate, and it’ll be hard to get them clean.

He’s still trying.

The lights of the underplate are winking into existence by the time she’s finally done watering the flowers and the victory fanfare of his phone suddenly fills the silence.

Three words. “They found Veld.” And the line cuts dead. Fuck.

“Sorry Princess, gotta go,” he says, flipping his phone shut. 

The change on her face is instantaneous. “What?”

“I said—”

“No.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t go.”

“Duty calls.” It doesn’t seem to be the thing to say. 

She scrambles up to him and clutches at him, frantic and wide-eyed. “Then take me with you.” 

Reno stares. She can’t be serious. So he calls her bluff. “No ya won’t.” 

“I will! I’ll go! I’m coming willingly! So, _please_.” And the more she talks the more manic her eyes become, wild and scared and angry and so full of regret. A look of pure desperation. The look of someone who wants to completely disappear. 

A stupid mission for a stupid kid and thirteen years later it’s done, huh? Just like that, huh? She’ll come willingly, huh? All because her boyfriend died, huh?

“No.” 

He shakes her off and heads for the door and she howls and chases after him, takes him by the arm and scrapes her feet against the floor in order to keep him from leaving. “Isn’t this what you wanted? Your mission. To gain my trust so I would come? Isn’t this what you get _paid_ for? Well I’m coming now, mission accomplished! Your entire life can finally have some meaning!”

Her words would cut if they had any feeling to them, if she wasn’t crying uncontrollably, if her voice wasn’t shaking to shit. But somehow they still make him mad. Drive him absolutely furious. He whirls around and gets into her face, backs her up against a pillar, and when she winces he slams both hands on either side of her. “Don’t fucking tell me what my life is worth. And don’t…” He sighs and slides his hands down and away, rubs his wrist with a gloved hand. “For fuck’s sake, don’t underestimate yours. Don’t throw it all away for one person.”

“Because I’m the last Ancient?”

“No, because you’re a fucking brat, Aeri—”

She swallows her name from his mouth and when he doesn’t react she tugs on his ponytail which kicks the most primal of his instincts into gear and he gnashes his teeth against hers, crushes her with his body and curves a hand hard over her shoulder, the other digging into her thigh as her legs wrap around his waist and he grinds into her and then—his phone rings.

He releases her like she’s made of fire, stares dumbly at her swollen lips and glassy eyes and ruddy cheeks and the way she slides against the pillar to support her weight, the way her breath flutters tremulously, and this girl just lost her boyfriend and was ready to commit herself to imprisonment because of it so what the fuck is he even doing?

“Please don’t leave,” she whispers, taking him by the hand. 

There’s dirt beneath her fingernails. 

His phone rings on and on and on—

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted so much to finish this in time for Aerith’s bday because of the thematic fit, but actually what a shitty present it would have been, so maybe it’s for the best it’s late. LOL. Still, happy fucking birthday, Aerith. <3
> 
> So, hey do you ever think about how Zack was probably Aerith’s first real friend (as well as bf) who never made her feel bad about herself and never wanted anything from her and didn’t ever leave her by choice? Do you do you doyou? Yeah, basically the reason this chapter is so late coming is because I knew I had to get in my CC feels again + navigate insane timelines + figure out wtf happened in BC (Narrator: she didn’t). Still, I hope it was worth the wait—We’ve earned the slash, folks!!! Sort of!!! Okay not really sorry!!!—but even if not, I promise the next and last chapter is forthcoming sooner than later, because it’s the chapter I’ve most wanted to write since the start. In fact it _was_ the fic back when I thought this story was just a oneshot/twoshot deal haaahahaha.
> 
> Anyway, really, truly, thank you for reading and for commenting and sticking with this story! It means so much and really does keep me determined to finish this weird little tale for Reno, Aerith, and you all! <333


End file.
